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p 685 SPEECH 

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Copy 1 



HON. A. Br BUTLER, 



oy 



SOUTH CAROLINA, 










ON TUB ^^rk S 



BILL TO ENABLE THE PEOPLE OF KANSAS TEKRTTORY 
TO FORM A CONSTITUTION AND STATE GOVERN- 
MENT, PREPARATORY TO THEIR ADxMIS- 
SION INTO THE UNION, ETC. 



IN THE UNITED STATES SENATE, JUNE 12, 1856. 



/ 

/ 



WASniNGTON : 
PRINTED AT THE UNION OFiaCB. 

1856. 



^ 



SPEECH. 



MR. BROOKS AND MR. SUMNER. 



.-^ Mr. BUTLER said : 

Mr. Presidknt : The occasion and the subject upon which I am about to address the Senate 
Or) of the United Slates, at this time, have been brought about by events over which I have had 
jA no control, and could have had none — events which have grown out of the commencement of 
^ a controversy for which the senator from Massachusetts (not now in his seat) [Mr. Sumner] 
should be held exclusively responsible to his country and his God. He has delivered a speech 
the most extraordinary that has ever had utterance in any deliberative body recognising the 
sanctions of law and decency. When it was delivered I was not here ; and if I had been pre- 
sent, what I should have done it would be perfectly idle for me now to say, because no one 
can substitute the deliberations of a subsequent period for such as might have influenced him 
at another time and under different circumstances. My impression now is that, if I had been 
present, I should have asked the senator, before he finished some of the paragraphs personally 
applicable to myself, to pause ; and if he had gone on, I would have demanded of him the next 
morning that he should review that speech, and retract or modify it, so as to bring it within 
the sphere of parliamentary propriety. If he had refused this, what I would have done I can- 
rK>t say ; yet I can say that I would not have submitted to it. But what mode of redress I 
sliould have resorted to I cannot tell. 

I wish I had been here. 1 would have at least assumed, as I ought to have done on my 
responsibility as a senator, and on my responsibility as a representative of South Carolina, all 
the consequences, let them lead where they might ; but instead of that, the speech has involved 
his own friends and his own colleague. It has involved my friends. It has involved one of them 
to such an extent that, at this time, he has been obliged to put his fortune and his life at stake. 
And, sir, if the consequences which are likely to flow from that speech shall end in blood and 
violence, that senator should be prepared to repent in sackcloth and ashes. 

Now, I pronounce a judgment on that speech which will be adopted by the public. I am as 
certain as I am speaking that it is now condemned by the public mind, and by posterity it will 
be consigned to infamy, for the michievous consequences which have flowed from it already, 
and such as are likely yet to disturb the peace and repose of the country. 

I said nothing, Mr. President, at any period of my life — much less did I say anything in the 
(Xiurse of the debate to which he purports to have made a reply — that could have called for, 
much less have justified, the gross personal abuse, traduction, and calumny, to which he has 
resorted. 

When 1 was at my little farm, enjoying myself quietly, and, as I thought, had taken refuge 
from the strifes and contentions of the Senate and of politics, a message was brought to me 
that my kinsman had been involved in a difficulty on my account. It was so vague that I did 
not know how to account for it. I was far from any telegraphic communication. I did not 
wait five minutes before I lefc home to put myself within the reach of such information — and 
garbled even that was — as was accessible. I travelled four days continuously to Washington ; 
and when 1 arrived I found the very subject under discussion which had given me so much 
concern ; and it has been a source of the deepest concern to my feelings ever since I heard of 
it, on many accounts — on account of my country, and on account of the honor and the safety of 
my kinsman. When I arrived here I found the subject ander discussion. I went to the Senate 
■worn down by travel ; and I then gave notice that, when the resolutions from Massachusetts 
should be presented, I would speak to them, as coming from a Commonwealth whose history, 
and whose lessons of history, had inspired me with the very highest admiration — I would 
speak to them from a respect to a Commonwealth, whilst, perhaps, the senator who had been 
the <-.iuse of their introduction ought not to deserve my notice, and would not have received it. 

Well, sir, days passed, and those resolutions were not presented. Now they have beeu 



prpsented, and presented in a different way from any that 1 have ever known to be submitted 
from any Commonwpalih before. They were not presented ly one of its senators, but were 
sent directly to the Pre.-^iJpiu of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives. 
I waited for some time, with the experlation that when ihe^e resolutions should come I would 
acquit myself of the painful task which circumstances had devolved upon me. They did not 
come until yesierday — more than two w^f-ks after their adoption. 

In the mean time — on Mi'ntay last — I eave notice that I would address the Senate to-day, 
under the confident be^itf, not that the present senator [Mr. Wilson] would be here — because I 
have nothing to do with him — but thai the senator who has Veen the aggressor, the criminal ag- 
grets.ir, m this matter, would l>e present ; and if I give cedence to the testimony of Dr. Boyle, 
I see no reason why he should not be present. For anything that appears in thit testimony, 
if he hid lean an officer of the army, and had not appeared the next day on the battle-field, he 
would h ive deserved to be cashif red. 

Sir, I am at a loss to know why he has aimed his assaults at me individually, and at my 
S'ate on more occasions than one; but I am willing to adopt the rlew aff-^rded by the Rev. 
Mr. Beecher ; and, as it it a clew upon the subject, I rely on it I wish nothing of mine to go 
out that 1 do not intend to beentirely consistent with the covictions of my mind. I ask to have 
Mr. Beecher's remarks read, I adopt them, and they will acquit the senator — or tiiey will go 
very far to acquit him. 

The Secretary read as follows : 

"The only complaint which I have ever heard ofSenator Sumner has been this: that he, by his 

ehrinking and sensitive nature, was not fit for the ' rough and tumble ' of politics in our day. 
He would have held him>elf back, and avoided giving the slightest offence, had it not been 
that he was reproved and goaded into it by, asl think, the injudicious criticism of friends." 

Mr. BUTLER. Sir, I believe it, and it will acquit his motives to some extent. Instead of 
making his Sjieech here his own, as a senator, under the obligations of the constitution, and 
the highest sanctions which can influence the conduct of an honorable man — instead of making 
it the vehicle of high thoughts and noble emotions that would become a man and a senator — 
it is obvious now that lie has made that speech but the conduit — I will use a stronger exprea- 
sion — the fung through which to express upon the pubhc the compound poison of malignity 
and injustice. 

This is confirmed by his remarkable exordium ; for, in many respects, this is the most ex- 
traoidinary speech that has ever found its way in any book, or upon any occasion, ancient or 
modern. I have never before heard rf proem or exordium by proclamation ; and yet, tefdre 
the delivery of his speech, by a telegraphic proclamation to I'heodore Parker, he uttered this 
remaikable sentence : " Whilst you are deliberating in your meeting I am about to pronounce 
the most thorough philippic that was ever heard in the Senate of the United States." This is 
in conformity with Mr. Parker's opinion. He was a flexible conformist invoking the spirit of 
Theodoie Parker as his muse to sus^tain him in the scrife for which, by his nature and his 
talents, he was not fit. Sir, it was the tribute and deference of a flexible conformist, willing to 
be a rhetorical fabricator to carry out the views and subserve the purposes of a man who, as I 
understand, is of an iron will and robust intellect; who loves controversy, and has abilities 
which more fit him, perhaps, for that than for worshipping the lamb as the emblem of inno- 
cence, and as the prototype of that Christ whose doctrines he has professed. To conciliate 
Paiker the senator must make war upon South Carolina and upon myself. If he supposed 
that he would gain laurf Is by any atiack on me because I was a '' foeman worthy of his steel," 
I might feel complimerited ; but there was no such purpose. It was to pander to the prejudices 
of Massachusetis, or a portion of Massachusetts — for God forbid that I should say anything 
whirh is not proper of Ma-sachnsetts — to pander to a porticn of Massachusetts by assailing 
South Carolina. Before I finish I sh.ll say what 1 think, and if he were here in his place I 
wou'd make him hang his head in shame ; for I will demonstrate, before I conclude, that, in 
what he has said of South Carolina, he has aspersed the nearest and dearest comrade of his 
mother. Yes, sir, a dege erate son, incapable of appreciating the relations which subsisted 
between Massachusetts and South Car lina at a time when there was something more of peril 
to be encountered tha ' exhibitions of rhetoric in the Senate of the United States ; when men 
placed their live^ and their fortunes on the iss.ue which had been made. I will prove him a 
calumniator. Wliile he has charg; d me with misstating history, law, and the constitution, let 
me say that " he who lives in glass houses sh(uld not throw stones." I here say, and I 
plei'ne myself to it, that 1 will convict him, and shall demand of the Senate a verdict of 
guilty. 

but, Mr President, there is one result of this speech which I think may be regarded as 
good I If! I . s shown, as Mr. Beecher says, that he is unfit for the wf r of debate. He has 
no business to gather the glories of the Senate chamber and fight with orators, unless he is 
prep.Mi d til maitita n the pisition of an honorable combatant Though his fiiends have in- 
vesnd hiKi with the cress of Acliiiles and offered him his armor, he has shown that he is only 
able to (ii:ht with the we, 'pons of Thereites, and deserved what that brawler received from the 
hand.s .f the gallant Ulyp^cs. 

I ni ist say, Mr. Prtsideni, that I was utterly disappointed in the body of the speech. In- 
dependent of the personalities which have distorted and disgraced it, there is nothing in ths 



Bpecch to dinlin^ufh it from pretty nearly all the speeches which ke has made upon this subject 
— and I b( lipvf- h'' hns KCiircRJy n\adi'. any sprrrhes on any oiher. He is one of those on©- 
idfn m( n who nlwayf sfo cne way. VVIhIhi tiiis sprcch hns much of ihe idrntiiy of former 
efforts, It Ims noor of ih(^ freahniss of tlwir oriti' (ility. If tlifTf; is ariythitig that varies it at 
all, and (listinjruishej it from the otliers, it is the caiiro pictures i-npresscil upon the '' warp and 
Wool" of hi.-i f 'roif r spcfches in the form of quotations ; some of which — I t^ay it as a moralist 
and as a senator — sinio the clolh upon which they are impressed, more by their obscenity 
than he oin adorn it with Ihe >(lare of their colnrinij. 

I liavp nuulc these remarks upon the character of ihe speech. He may regard them as criti- 
cisrn. Wh'ther my critic sm be one that will be ado. ted by the public, or such as will 
address it.-jflf to the good tasu; and good seii.se of this audience, I know not. 1 have given th« 
convictions of my mind. After these remarks upon the character of the speech, I come to 
make my pom's; and I will maintain thjm, not by g' rie.ral charges without specifications ; not 
by that proclivity to error and falsehood which he so decently imputed to me ; not by general 
declamation from which he can take refuge in his own authority ; but 1 will prove them by 
docum>nis b' yond all question. 

In the first place, I suy, that what the senator said of me nrd of the State of Sou'h Carolina 
Was dragged into the deb.ite by no law of legiti'nate association or connexion ; but it was 
injected into his speech p^sitivelv in disregard of ihe tone and spirit of mine — neither in reply 
to, nor m iecoi;niiion of, the kindness anii fjrbearance which pervaded my speech. Sir, I am 
now passing through the last chapter of my public life. When 1 came here this year, I said to 
friends, "The last thin^ I would wish is to have my riame or reputation, if I have any. asso- 
ciated with party strife, much less with party contentions." My speech upon the Kansas 
question was the must guarded and remarkable for its forbearance of any that 1 have ever 
delivered. I commenced it by this declaration : 

*' It may be said that 1 hive passed through the ordeal of experience, and perhaps of time, 
and that th' y have har! th- ir inflr.ence on my temper ; but, sir, 1 look on anvihin» like a rupture 
in civil government, and especially such a one as would throw us into the horrors of anarchy, 
with not the same view as others who may he more intrepid, and who may think ihcy can 
come out of it without hazard to th-mselves. There is no'.hmg so mischievous to society as 
any n ovement affecting its t-tability, uncontrolled by responsibihly and unregulated by intelli- 
gence." 

Upon another occasion I remarked that 1 would be the last man to do or to say anything 
that would C' nimit the i^sue in Kan.'as to the arbitrament of the sword in the hands of youth. 
Mine was a warning and a kind voice. 

Before I proceed with the argument of my main points further, I will make a suggestion 
whii.h may, i erhaps, appeur par' nthetical. Wtien the senator from Mussathusetts took his 
seat near me, I knew thut he was a free-soiler, or abolitionist, as it tvas termed ; but notwith- 
etanding that, I had read some of his productions, and he was introduced to me, or ptrhaps I 
to him. I had kno *.n many who came into the Senate of the United S'ates reeking with pr< ju- 
dices from heme, who afterwards had the courage to lift themselves above the temporary influ- 
ences which had controlled them. I supposed that a man who had read history lould not be 
a bigot I believed that one who was imbued w th the literature which that senator's mind 
had imbibed, could not sin in the face of light and truth, and the lessons of history. With 
these view.s I did not hesitate to keep up wiiat my friends complained of, an intercouise with 
him, which was calcu'ated to give him a currency far beyond what he might have had if I had 
not induLeJ m lliat Sfitcies of intercourse. My friends here and every where know it. When 
I made my reply to him on the Nebraska a' d Kansas bill, I complimented him I did not 
hesitate to compliment him, and he was gratified at it, for he said so. His opinion of me aa 
a lawyer was very diderent then, (if ( may be adowcd to speak of what he tlien said ) not 
only on this floor but to other persons. 1 did not hesitate to forbear a proscriptive judgment 
on any man i.ecause he happened to ditfr with me to-day or to-morrow -, for life, sir, is but a 
span anyhow. I ihoui;ht the lime might come when the tide of ev-nts wou'd bring to him the 
awful certain y of the doctrines which he held, and which, in the first instance, when he came 
here, he was not ilisposed to propagate 

Things stood in thi.s way until one day when it was proposed here to repeal the fugitive 
slave law. 1 .-aid that I hod no great confi fence in that law, and turned to him with an honest 
purpose, with no design whatever to provoke anything like a personal or sectional issue, 
and asktd of the senutor from Massachusi tis whether, if there were no fugitive-slave law, 
Massichusetts would be willing to carry out the provis on of the constitution. Then it was, 
in excitement, or, as he snid, "impu'se" — an imulse, as I characterized it then, of the drawer — 
he rose aid asked. me if " he was a dog to do i - ihing.'" I treated this answer with riuicule; 
it abso'iitt ly did not touch my h' art ; and af ei tn <l I spoke to him. 

Three day ufierwards he came in wit'i a laboroi philippic touching me more deeply than he 
had bef'Te ; but he then made, for the first time, a charge affer ling the revolutionary his- 
toiy of South Carolina, by saying that John Rutledge, who was honored by Washington and 
all his couniiymen, and who is a historical cliaracter, hod offered, in 1779, in a negotiali'-n 
with IV'-vosi. at the gate-i of Char'esion, that S ■uth Caro'ina slioidd be. neu'rul during the war 
of the Ilevolution. 1 did not wait until the next morning to reply to him. 1 re&ponded at 



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once ; and I have no doubt I replied with indignation. 1 have no doubt that niy heart threw 
the words upon him. iVlortified vanity has no conscience It may be that he did not think he 
came out of that controversy with as much credit as he shouM — at least his friends may have 
thouglit so I gave him notice, however, that after tliat 1 should have no communication with 
him whatever — the bridjife had been cut down — and I never have had. 

Two years plapsed,and during that time I am bound injuj-tice here tosay,I have scarcely spoken 
to, of, or about hmi : and perhaps, when I did speak about him, I said somethmg which he 
wculd have been gratified to hear. iWy friends think that sometimes I did. Whatever the 
temptation of my resentment may be, I have pessed, and shall pass, throug;h life with one 
determination : If I can/iot do justice, I will not do injustice to any man. I have exhibited 
here in debate, on more occasions than one, impatience and excitability. These are peculiari- 
ties which have followed me from the cradle. Perhaps sometimes anger in its ebullitions may 
have found an expression from me ; but, thank God, I can say it was but a transient feeling, 
which at the time gushed from the heart; it was a feeling which subsequently was suppressed 
by reason and repentance. That, however, is a failing which cannot inhabit the same mind 
with treachery and malignity. 

Now, sir, I proceed to make my points; and I shall show that what the senator said of 
myself and South Carolina was not in response to anything which I said; that he has 
gone outside the record to bring into the debate matters which did not legitimately belong to it 
by association or connexion. 

1 will maintain these three propositions so certainly that, in my opinion, there will not be 
one mind here, unless it be disposed to morally perjure itself, which will not acquiesce in them. 
I will show that his remarks upon me and South Carolina were untrue and unjust ; the language 
usee ^vas licentious ; the spirit which prompted it was aggressive ; and the whole tenor and 
tone of the speech was malignant and iusulting. 

In no speech wiiich I have made during this session did I name Massachusetts or South 
Carolina. This is a most remarkable thing, considering the nature of the debate. I have 
culled what I s^id, and I have not introduced South Carolina by name into the debate, nor have 1 
brought in Massachusetts. Yet, .sir, this senator alludes to me in two paragraphs. I should 
like to know why he did not finish my picture in one sketch on the first day, when he spoke of 
mo as being " Don duixote in love with slavery as a mistress because she was a harlot." I 
dislike to repeat the obscenity of his illustration. When he had me under review then, why- 
did he not fini.sh me in t'nat general sketch? He took another night; and during that night 
the chaotic conceptions either emanated from his own mind, or were suggested to it by 
thofe busy people who seem to have control over him ; and then it was that he made thia 
celebrated attack on me, assailing my reputation as a gentleman of veracity : 

"With regret I come again upon the senator from South Carolina, [Mr. Butler,] who, 
omuipre.'^ent in this debate, overflowed wiih rage at the simple suggestion that Kansas had 
applied for admission as a State ; and, with incoherent phrases, discharged the loose expecto- 
raiion of his speech, now upon her representative, and then upon her people. There was no 
extrvaijance of the ancient parliamentary debate which he did not repeat ; nor was there any 
possible deviation from the truth Vyihich he did not make — with so much of passion, I am glad 
to add, as to s.^ve him from the suspicion of intentional aberration. But the senator touches 
nothing which he does not disfigure — with error, sometimes of principle, sometimes of fact. He 
shows an incapacity of accuracy, whether in staling the constitution or in stating the law, 
whether in the details of statistics or the diversions of scholarship. He cTnnot ope his mouth 
but out there flies a blunder. Surely, he ought to be familiar with the life of Franklin ; and 
yet he referred to this household chaiacier, while acting as agent of our fathers in England, aa 
abiive sus|)icion ; and this was done that he might give point to a false contrast with the agent 
of Kansas — not knowing that, however they may difl'er in gemus and fame, in this experience 
they are alike; that Franklin, when intrusted with the petition of Massachusetts bay, was as- 
saulted by a foul-mouthed speaker, where he could not be heard in defence, and denounced as 
a ' thief,' even as the agent of Kansas has been assaulted on this floor and denounced as a 
'foiger.' And let not the vanity of the senator be inspired by the parallel with the British 
Etatfsmen of that day, for it is only in hostility to freidom that any parallel can be lecognised. 

" But it is aga nst the people of Kansas that the sensibilities of the senator are particularly 
aroused. Coming, as he announces, ' from a State' — ay, sir, from South Carolina — lie turns 
with lordly disgust from this newly-forn.ed community, which he will not recognise even as 
' a body politic' Pray, sir, by what tit'e does he indulge in this egotism ? Has he rtad the 
history of ' the State ' which he represents ? tie cannot surely have forgotten its shameful im- 
becility from slavery, confessed throughout the Revolution, followed by its more shameful 
assumptions for slavery since. He cannot have forgotten its wretched persistence in the slave 
trsdeas the very apple of its eye, and the condition of its pt.rticipation in the. Union. He can- 
not have forgotten its constitution, which is re|iublic;m only in name, confirming power in the 
hands of the few, and founding the qualifications of iis legislators on 'a settled freehold e.state 
and ten negroes.' And yet the senator, to whom that ' State ' has in part committed the 
guardianship of its good name, instead of moving, with backward treading steps, to cover its 
nake liics.'^, rushe.-? forward, in the very ecstasy of madness, to expose it by provoking a com- 
parison with Kansas!" 



Now, Mr. President, I riti gr>ing lo state a proposition w'hirh will eiartlc the Senate : what 
he here undcriakts to qiidle hh the contiitution (f Sourih C(ut)lin;i, in rtfercncc to the eli^ihihty 
of mcinln rs of thi- Irpislalore, is not lo ijc found m ii ut ull. i low did ho brinK it in in ret^pocise 
to any speech of mint? He has tworn in his alH lavil ihut wiiat he caid was fairly in response 
to the speeches which I hnd made. I put the (|uestioii to seiiiiiora, and I fliiail pause for their 
sentence: How dare he, from anythn.g in my Npccches, put his fiof^cr— his profane fini^er — 
upon the constitution of South Curolina? Is that a rtspiin.'^e to anyihina; wh:ch I said? My 
speeches heretofore deliveird are upon record, and can be lefcrrf d to. I neither ailad!;d to tho 
constitution of South Carolina, nor did I mention South Carohna in the whols debute ; and 
yet in his affidavit he says th;it i^.ll these arc fairly rcferuiile a» a response to the remarks of the 
senator from South Carolina! W hut he has quoted here is not in the constitution of South 
Carolina; and wlien he undei-takcs to sulject mo to the severity of his criticismn, as a Ijlun- 
deier in the s ateni.mis of law and constitution, let i:ini stand convict'd of one of two things — 
either that he did not road the constitution of South Curolioa himseif, and a;Jopted it from 
Otlnrs, or that, if he read it, he could nut understand it. I intend t) dwell upon ihi.i point 
with a view to convict him — not ihut 1 am going to vindicate the coiisiitiition of South Caro- 
lina, but I will convict this rhetorical jurist — this n.an who undertiikes to sit on the tripod, 
and publibh the oracles of Delphi, to tit upon me as a lawyer! My G'>d ! what have I come 
to? A man who never managed a case (as far as I know) in court, to sit on myself who have 
been thirty-five years engageti in law, either in appearing at the bar or expounding it on the 
bench ! 

I have never delivered a judgment on a question of law h^re, as a member of the Committee 
on the Judiciary, whether I have made tho majority or tlie minoiity r:'port, when that senator 
has not concurred with me; or, if he differed, it has been on .-(cti'nial questions on which he 
has been overruled by the overwheliuii g fuitliority of the Senate. Y<-t, a inan who has agreed 
with me always — and that is the only b.-.d sign about it [laughter] — undenakfs lo r\i in judg- 
ment on my legal attainments ! If liis authority is worth anytliiMg, it is with me, for he lias 
concurred with me. On all the contested election cases we have ii:;reed — except, perhaps, in 
the Piielpa case. There he may have differed from me ; but if he did, the Senate overruled 
him. 

That, however, is not the question which I was approaching. I said that what he stated in 
reference to the con.'^titiition of South Carolina was not in response to anything which had 
fallen from me, and that there was no such thing to be found in the constitution of South 
Carolina as he has quoted. I will read the clause: 

" No person shall be eligible to a seat in the house of representatives unless he i.^ a free 
white man, of the age of twenty-one years, and hath been a citizen and resident of tUs State 
three years previous to his elecfon. If a resident in the election district, he shall not be eligible to 
a seat in the hou.'-e of representatives imless he be legally .■seiz'^d and possessed, in his own 
risfht, of a settled freehold e-tate of five hundred acres of land and ten nesjroes ; or of a real estate 
of the value of one hundred and fifty pounds sterling, clear of debt. If a non-resident, he shall 
be legally seized and possessed of a settled freehold estate therein of the value of five hundred 
pounds sterling, clear of debt." 

I venture to say that nearly half of the members of the legi.slature of South Carolina, par- 
ticularly those who come from the towns and cities, do not own a negro at all ; and very few 
of them, as my colleogue knows, own five hundred acres of land. Merchants do not want it ; 
lawyers do not want it. The tenure by which they hold their ofii-es is mainly by the latter 
clau.-e, which the senator left out, that a man to be eligible to a seat in the house of reprcsenta- 
tivce must own property to the amount of <£150 sterling, dear of debt. That is a little over 
$700. Now 1 have got him ; I call on senators to convict him. There is but one verdict which 
can be rendered. He has gone out of the way to assail the constitution of South Carolina, and, 
in assailing it he is guilty of the worst of all faults. I cannot conceive of a worse predicament 
llian his, who, professing pedantic accuracy, and sitting in judgment on the quotations of 
pthers, is reduced to the alternative of admitting that he never read what he quoted, or, if he 
had read it, could not understand it, or garbltd it. 

Again, sir, he says the constitution of Souih Carolina is republican only in form. I say 
there is no State in the Union whose constitution gives a more enlarged right of suffrage. I 
have not the provision now bef re me, but I can state what my coileague knows to be the fact, 
that every free white man of South Carolina, of the nge of twenty-one, has a right ol suffrage, 
provided he pays seventeen shillings of tax. I may be mistaken, perhaps, '.n the amount. 

Mr. EVANS. Th#re is no tax at all required, if he is a r- sident, and has resided six 
months in the election di.strict. Then he is entitled to vute without pro[K;rty qualification. 

Mr BUTLER. If he has resided tnere for six months no property qual ficu inn is re- 
quired ; but, if he has not resided so lonjr, he must have a very small amount of land. Our 
peojile do not even pay a poll-tax. Here is the provision of the South Carolina constitution : 

" Every free white man of the age of twenty-one years, paupers and non-commissioned of- 
fi-'ers and private soldiers of ihearmy of the United States excepttd, being a citizen of this State, 
and having resided therein two years previous to the day i^f election, and who hath a freehold of 
fifty acres of land, or a town lot of which he hath been legally seized and possessed at least 



8 

six months before such election, or, not havin? such freehold or town lot, hath been a regide»t 
in the election district in winch he offers to give his vote six months before the said elecMon» 
shall have a right to vote for a member «r members to serve in either branch of the legislature 
for the election district in which he holds such property, or is so resident." 

The senator has presumed (o characterize her constitution as republican only in form, when 
it has the freest and most enlarged right of suffiage of any Sta'e in the Union. I grant you 
that, when the legishitnre comes into operation under the constitution, there are conservatiTe 
elemfnis which, I thank God, huve withstood the wild feelins^ of what is called the progress of 
the times ; but it does not become me to allude to them now. 

I come next to an allegation wliich, if the senator were here, I think he would not look me 
in the face when I repeat ; and that is, his insolent and untrue charge of the " shomefu! imbe- 
cility" of South Carolina during the war of the Revolution in consequence of slavery. Sir, in- 
gratitude is the monster of vices, and when it is associated with injustice, it ous;ht to be con- 
demned by the consuming indignation of even those who may to-morrow be our adversaries. 
Wliat are the facts.' The news of the baitle of Lexington was carried to Charleston by ex- 
press ; and the very day they received the intelligence fhe Liberty men, as they were called^ 
broke opon the arsenals and distributed the arms It was but a few days afterwards before 
Boston sent a vessel to South Carolina for bread and wine. We sent them, I think, S3, 500 
worth of provisions, and seventy barrels of wine ; the Maine liquor law did not prevail in 
Boston at that time. [Laughter] We gave them bread ; and, I answer for it, South Caroli- 
na has never asked pay fir her hospitality. She would never brook the thought of asking pay 
for the bread she poured out upon her countrymen — countrymen they were, sir. Massachu- 
setts was without powder then, and we furnished her with it. 

Here I will say, lest I forget it, that the battles of Lexington and Bunker Hill in the Revolu- 
tion I regard a< the battles of Marathon and Salamis. They gave the Commonwealth of iVias- 
sachusetts an immortality for commencing the glorious contest which has resulted in the inde- 
pendence of these United States; and 1 shall be the last man to touch thj laurel crown which 
grows from the blood that enriched the soil u| on which those battles were fought. The very 
powder that was used after the battle o'" Bunker Hill was furnished by South < "arotina. Here 
is the entry, not only in the history of South Carolina, but in the history of Massachusetts. 
In Ramsay's History of the Revolution in South Carolina, volume 1, page 43, you will find : 

" At ihe time all these military preparations were maliing, the whole quantity of powder in 
the province did not exceed three thousand pounds. The people not originally designing a 
military opposition, no care was taken to provide stores ; but now, reduced to the alternative 
of fighting or submittiog, extraordinary methods were taken to obtain a supply. The inhab- 
itants of East Florida having never joined in measures of opposition to Great Britain, the 
ports of that province were open for the purposes of trade. 

"Twelve, persons, in which number were indud- d Captains Tempirere, Cochran, St.=itter, 
Tufts, .loyner, Messrs. Tebant, Williamson, and Jenkins, authorized by the Council of Safety, 
sailed from (harleston for thst coast, and, by surprise, boarded a vessel near the bcir of St. 
Augustine, though twelve Bri'ish grenadiers of the 14ih regiment were on board. They took 
out fifteen thousand pounds of po^vde"-, for which they gave a bill of exchange to the captain ; 
and, having secured a safe retreat to themselves by spiking the guns of the powder vessel, they 
set sail for Carolina. Apprehending that they should be pursued, they steered for Beaufort. 
From that place they came by the inland navigation, and de'ivered th'ir prize to the Council 
of Safety, whilst their pursuers were looking for them at the bar of Charleston. This sea- 
sonable supply enabled the people of South Carolina to oblige their suffering brethren in Mas- 
sachusetts, who, though iinniediately exposed to the British army, were in a great measure 
destitute of that necessary article of defence." 

In a book published in Boston, entitled " Dealings with the Dead," I find these entries : 

" Our southern confederates i>re entitled to civility, because ihey are men and brethren ; and 
they are entitled lo kindness and courtesy from ks of Boston because we owe them a debt 
of gratitude, which it would be shatiipful to foiget. Since we -.f the North have pre- 
sumed to be undirtttkers upon this occasion, let us do the thing *■ de center el ornate.'' Besides, 
our friends of the South are notoriously lesty and hot- headed ; they are, geograpliicilly, chil- 
dren of the sun. John Smith's description of the Mas achu^etts Indi'ins, in 1614, llichrnond 
edition, 2, J94, is truly applicable to the southern people: ' very kind, but, in their fury, no lest 
valiant.' 

"I am no more inclined to uphold the South in the continued practice of a moral wrong, be- 
cause they gave us bread when we Wf^re hungry, as they certainly did, than was Sir Matthew 
Hale to deride favorably for the suitor who sent him the fat buck "***** 

".Tune 24, 1774. — Twenty four days after the p')rt bill went into opiration, a public meeting 
was held at Charlesttm, South Carolina. The movinsr spirits were the Trapieis and the El- 
liots, the Horrifs and the Cl.irksons, the Gad.-tdens and ^he Pinckneys, of that day; and reso- 
lutions were passed full of brotlnrly love and syrnfmlhy for the inhabitants of Boston." * * • 

"New York, August l.'i, 1774.— Saturday last Captain iJickerson arrived here, and br-ught 
three huodied and seventy-six barres of rye from South Carolin.., to be sold, and proceeds 
remiitpd to Boston, a present to the sulTercrs ; and a still larger cargo is to be shipped for the 
like benevolent purpose." * * * »* « * * • 

" Let the work of abolition go forward in a dignified and decent spirit. Let us argue ; and, 



9 

TO far nSAC rightfully mny, let ua Irffislaie. Let us bring the whole world's sympolhy up to 
the woik of en ikh ipaiioii. But let us not revile and viiupcrnlc thos'' wlio are, to nil inienla 
and purposrs, our brethren, as certaiidy aa if they livrd juMt over the Roxbury line, i"8ieid of 
Mason and Dixon's. Smh harsh and iinniiiigiited ec'dHog nrid abuse, ua we loo often wit- 
ness, are rqu. illy ungracious, urgentlernunly, arid ungiati ful." 

The senator says that the Sonihrrn States, in coiisequrnce of slavery, betrayed durirg the 
revolutionary wur a '* sli!\irie!ul inibr'-ility .'' I cluiHenjie him ro thf truth fif history. There 
was not a bailie fought south of the Potoruuc which was not fought by Bnutt'ern troops and 
slaveholder.", even if you choose to exclude Pennsylvania, which was at that time a ftliivi hold- 
ing State. Muhlenbtrg's continenini regiinfnt was always with them, and I love to uilude to 
it ; but not a New England squad, conip.itiy, or regimei't, ever passed the Potomac ; and yet 
the senator pays that but for northern aid the Southern States could not have sustained them- 
Brlves. 

Sir, who fought the battle of King's Mountain? It was not fought by anybody in pay. 
Patriots fought it, but they never r-eceived a dollar. That baitle made an impr»ssion, perhaps 
the most remarkable of any duriiig the war. It tumid the tide rf events. Who fought the 
battle of Cowpuis.' There was none in th.'it battle from the north offldiaryland. Her com- 
mander, Howard, is perhap.g, rri some respects, the hero of that actron. "Colonel Washington, 
commarider of the cavalry, and Pitkens, a fitizen of South Carolina, arid one of the heroes of 
the revolu'.io' ary war, crmmunded the militia, and they never shrank from their post. It haa 
been ssiii ot tlie South Carolina militia, during the revf.lutior ary war, that they were the only 
raw troops who i-tood to their guns and position whenever they were mustered into the service 
and cdlled upon to perform duty 

Who fought the battle of Hobkirk's Hill.' Gen. Green was the commander -, and he after- 
wai'ds became a slaveholder, and, of his own choice, lived and died in a Soiiihern State, among 
friends and comrades in arme. Whe fought the baitle of Entaw.'' Was there any New Eng- 
land regiment, or company, or squad tiiere.' Not flne. 1 hat battle, the most distiiiKUi^hed 
which has ever been fought in the southern ponionof the confederacy, wasf ugl t by southern 
slaveholdrrs from Maryland, Vireinia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and G<orgit. They 
were exclusively southern troops. In the face of these facts the .senator said the imbecility of 
the Sourh, arisii g from slavery, was such tl;at ihey could not fight their b:itlles without aid. 

Shame ! I cail upon the shade of Hancock and AiJams to look down and r« prove a degene- 
rate son who can thus invade the very sanctuary of the history which has given them immor- 
tality. 

Do you think that, sir, by this remark 1 reproach the troops of New England .> No, sir. 
When Yorktown surrendered there was not a New England regiment there ; i have a list o 
the iroops who were present. But ,because I sny that southerrr troops and those fn m Penn- 
sylvnnja alone engaged in these dislrnguished baiilea, do I renroach tlie troops of iVjassuchu- 
eett'-r God forbid! They were under the command of Washington at the time when he 
■went to Yf rktown, and, as was his duty, he sent them to defend ttie vulnerable points ot New 
York and Boston. 

Now, 1 v,i!l make a remark v. hich I hope the Senate will remember: Notwithstanding their 
rela'ive numbers, compared wiih the pay-list of New England, you may tiike the fighting days — 
if you have a mind to compute it as ycu would labor — you may take the fighting day^ during 
which the iro' ps of South Carolina were engiged, and in the couiputaiioci the balance will be 
found greatly i-gainst Mafsachusitts. If yi u have a mind to draw some other itsi — if you 
wish i<> test the qucition of sacrifice, and meas^ire it by blood — South Ccirilina has poured out 
hogsheads of bloi d wh're gallons have bcfn poured out by Massachusetts. 

In proof of this I give a Vin of battles fought in South Caruiir.a, and each was a bloody 
batite: , 

Battle of Fort M-mltrie : battle c( Stono; siege of Charhston ; battle of Camlen ; battle of 
Haiging Ro'^k ; battle of Muegrore's Mill -, batile of Blaik-tocks ; battle of Georgetown, and 
the battle at Bhck Wings, by Alarion ; battle of Kugs Mouniam ; battle of Co^pens ; bat- 
tle of Fish DAtn Pord, liy Sumpier; battle at Ninety six ; batile at Foil G.ilpbin ; lai.leat 
Fort Watson; ba'tle at Fort IVIott ; battle at Hobkirk's Hill; battle i f Gra-iby; battle of 
Cedar Spring; b itle of Hammond's Store; battle rf Q,uinby ; batHe of Eutaw ; battle of 
Ro. ky M"U.ii; battle of Port Rtiyai; battle of Tuafinuy; ba tie of Coosaha'chii.'; battle of 
Waxliani Seulement. b twecn Beaiifort and Tarleton; l>ai;le of Cluud's C:eck; batile at 
Hays'^- Station; bloody battle of Kettle Cr ek, fought by General Pickens; ba'tle of Houck'a 
defeat. 

The.?e were all fought in South Carolina, and in which South Carolinians were engaged, and 
•were bloody battles. In addition, there were almost daily skirmishes fought by Mai ion and 
Sumpter. 

But I do not bli-me Massachusetts, for I have paid she had g'ory entugh, and she was covered 
with glory enuugh hy t:ikir,g the bol;! stai.d which she did in | uitind the ball of rev, lutiun ia 
motion ; but, when the senator undertakes to cast rer.ri'achea on the history of Sou h Caro- 
lina, he ui!i h ive to tike i;n il compari.-^oiis. S'e got bread from her comrade. The mm 
who now repr-Daches South l arol-na, as I taid a little while ago, is a degenerate .son reproach- 
intr thede.iiest and licarc^i cur.iraife of his moiher. You cannot gel over tl»'3 err'^rs h' ha;* com- 
mitted in history; you cannot obviate the malignity with which the arrow has been shot. 



^ 



■\Vhethcrhe shot it with the reckless aim of one who had his hand upon the how, and directed 
the shaft conscious that it had been dipped in the poison of others, I know no'; but I have 
unrr;a^:k»d him — I have detected and exposed the man who chnrjres mi; with error, and such a 
pr,5c.l;vity to error that I cannot observe the line of tru h wiihi ut such deviations as to bring 
on me the censure, not of one intenticnally guilty rf fulsfhood, but one v/ho, under the gust 
an I whi.lwind of passion, cannot observe the line of truth. I have detected him ; 1 have ex- 
prspd him ; and now I demand of the Senate a vrdict of jrudty. 1 pause, sir. 

But now, since he has given his tesiimony, 1 will a-^k that the testimony of another man may 
be re d--the opinion of Daniel Webster with regard to the revolutionary history of South 
Carolina and Alassachusetts. 

The Secretary read the following extract frcm Mr. Webster's reply to Mr. Hayne, delivered 
January 2 J, 1830: 

"Then, sir, the gentleman has no fault to find with these recently-pr 'mulgatcd South Caro- 
lina opinions. Am), certainly, he need have none ; for his own s 'lUmients, as now advanced, 
and advanced on reflection — as far as 1 have been able to omprehend them — go the full length 
of all these opinions. I propose, sir, to pay something on these, and to consider how far they 
are just and constitutiij^lil. Bt fore doing that, however, let me c bservc, that the eulogium 
pronounced on the character of tie State of South Carolina by the honorable gentleman, for 
her revolu'ionary and other ureriis, meets my hearty concurrence. I shall not acknowledge 
that the honorable member goes before me in regard for whatever of distinguished talent, or 
distiiiguished charae-.ier, ^oulh Carolma has produced. 1 claim part of the honor — 1 partake in 
the price — of her great names. I claim them for countrymen — one and all — the Laurenses, 
the Rutiedges, the Piirckiiey;;, the Sumpters, the Marions — Americans all — v. hose fame is no 
more to be hemme:! in by State line.s than their talents and patriotism were capable of being 
circumscribed within the .same narrov/ limits. In their day and generation they served and 
honored the country, and the whole country ; and their renown is of the treasures of the whole 
country. Him whose honored name the gentleman himself bears — dots he e^;teem me less 
capable of gratitude for his patriotism, or sympathy for his sufferings, than if his eyes had first 
opened upon the light of Massachusetts, instead ol South Carolina? Sir, does he suppose it 
i.i his power to exhibit a Carolina name so bright as to produce envy in my bosom? No, sir ; 
increased gratification and delight, rather. 1 thnnk God that, if I am gifted with little of the 
spirit which is able to raise mortals to the skies, I have yet no.ie, as I trust, of that other spirit 
which would drag angels down. When 1 shall be found, sir, in my place here, in the Sanate, 
or elsewhere, to sneer at public merit, because it happens to S[)ring up beyond tlie little limits 
of my own State or neighborhood ; wiien I refuse, for any sufh cause, or for any cause, the 
homage due to American talent, to elevated | airioiism, to sincere devotion to liberty and 
the country ; or, if I sc;e an uncommon endowment of Heaven — if I see extraoidmary capacity 
and viituein any son of the South — and if, n.oved by local prejudice or gangttned by State 
jealousy, 1 get up here to abate the tithe of a hair from his just character and just fame, may 
my tongue cleave to the ro(.f of my mouth ! • 

" Sir, let me recur to pleasing recollections — let me indu'ge in refreshing remembrances of 
the past — let me remind you that, in early times, no States cherished greater harmony, both of 
principle and feeling, than Massachusetts and South Caiolii-.a. AVould to God that harmony 
m'ght again return ! Shoulder to shoulder they went throush the Revolution — harid in hand 
they stood around the administration of Washington, and felt his own great arm lean on them 
for support. Unkind feeling, if it exist, alienation and distrust, are the growth, unnatural to 
such soils, of false principles since sown. They are weeds, the seeds of which that same 
great arm never scattered." 

Mr. BUTLER. Sir, Daniel Webster is a Doric statue upon a co'os?al pedestal raised by 
the hands of patriots' — raised by the hands of statesmen ; a pedestal whifh is imperi.-hable as 
long as the achievements of heroes, patriots, and statesmen can be transmitted to posterity by 
history. His tribute to South Carolina is worth something. It is the tribute of a statesman 
and an orator — of a man who could lift himself above the bigony, a: d even preoarc to be 
crushed under the v;heel, of wild fanaticism. It is such a tribute as was paid by an orator like 
Pericles, who had guiiJed the he'm of State, who had an Athenian sprit of patriotism, who 
wes an orator ar.d a statesman. Who is he that new gives a different opinion of South Caro- 
lma? Is It not a Cleon — one whose warfare is to assdii his antagonist by crimination, calum- 
ny, ar;d private slander — a man who draws his similes from obf-cene sources, and always 
thinks he has conquered when he has mortified and nuit the feelings of his adver.^ary ? 

.Sir, when 1 look at the evidence to which I have adverted, when I allude to the opinions pro- 
nounced between the tv.-o gentlemen --beiv.^een Mr. Webster and the senator from Massachu- 
setts who is absent — I can well say, 

" Look upon//(a< picture, and then upon this" — 

' I will not finish the quotation ; I shall say nothing in this debate but what I believe to be true. 
If I were to undertal e to compare the senator from Mas.-aehu. etts with tlie coarseness of Cleon 
in some of his similes, imd his grossne ss in some of his attacks on his adversary — I mean in 
point of taste — I might do injustice to my own criticirm, because I believe the senator is a man 



11 

who undcrfltands the use of langua^R — a i»entleman who haa gone back to classic fountains, 
end in thai respect I seji.uate him from Cleon. l>iit otlicrwiee rmt at nil. Lft ll.e young men 
and lioys wlio hour me, go ar.d rc:ul ihc life of Cleon, and, when they do, let tliem leud the 
notice which even Gi-ote attaclies to it, the author whn h^a taken the most fuvornhle view of 
thdt demi'gogue — wiio could revcr lift himself above the local prejudice that Hurroundid iuin, 
and alanys pnndeied to it in order to obiciin a conquest over Ins rival wi»<> wus in power, aiid 
wa3 mainta'ning llif- honor and dignity of liisi country. 

Now, I come to another branch of the ?ulject,nnd it is, I confess, the eores-t one of all. The 
se'iator has made a very ijravc charge upon John Rutlcilgo; not upon South Ciirolina in that point 
of view. Tbe facts in relition to that transaction arc these : when General Lincoln wn.s called 
to iho command of tlie Suuthern arinv, Prevosl w.-.s in possession of Savannah, and Gciirgia 
in fact was undir British auihority. When Lincoln took command of the southern tmops, he 
conceived the bold exierimcnt of crossing the Savannah river and rerlairning Georgia. Ht3 
wily adversary, who was in Savannah, took advantage of his being at Augusta, about one 
hundred and fifiy miles ol>ov'e, crossed the river at Savannah, and made his way t'> the galea 
of Charleston. When he reaihed Charleston, there were but about six hundied troo|.s under 
the command of Moultrie, and as many under Pulaski. He had about four thousand. Tiio 
militia, and, 1 believe, even the women, kef)t watch the whole night for far the town would be 
stormed. In order to gam time, a parley was proposed the nixt day. Ruiledg,^ sent three 
diirtrent commif.Ri'ins. He knew that Lincdn wou'd be upon the British if he could only de- 
tain them for a day That parlf-y wa.^ regarded by his friends as a stratagem. Some of his 
enemies were disposed to assail liim for it. Whilst they were on that very parley Moultrie 
said that Rui'edgehad no right ti touch the garrison; he "hiin-".elf v/as commander-in-chief, ar.d 
Rudedge could do nothing as governor to comply with the terms which, for appearance sake, 
he had proposed. Here is the notice of it by the historian : 

" It was pre suir.ed by the garrii-on that General Lincoln, with the army under his command, 
wns in f lose pursuit of General Prevost, but his precipe situation was unknown to every- person 
within the lines. To gain time in puch circumstances was a matter of great consequence. A. 
whole day was therefore spent in sending and receiving flags. Commissioners re m the gHiii- 
son at Chor'eston were insTucieil to propose ' a neutrality during the, war It tween Great Brit- 
ain anJ America ; and ll at the question, whether the State shall heli>nL' to Great Britain or re- 
main one of the UniieJ S'ates, be determined by the treaty of peace bi.twcen these powers.' " — 
Ramsay's History, vol. 2, p. 27. 

Whilst they wire upon that parley, it hnppened that Lincoln came up and drove off Pre vost. 
That very propisition of Kutledge resu'ted in the m»fety of Charleston. Some ot his enemies 
have said that the terror of his situation was so grftat, the women and children being in the 
town, with only twelve hundred troops to defend it, that he was willing to capituUte on such 
terms as would save inr.ocen. e from the dangeis of a storm. His friends have given it a dif- 
ferent compli xion. Be that as it may, everybody knows that the goverror of South Carolina 
at that time had no power to make such an en^agem-nt. Prevost knew it just as well as any- 
body else. If he had f grted to ir, I presume Rutledjje could havedravn out of it the next day, 
onthegiound that thcTC was no authoiity to make the stipulation. It was duiii.g the lime 
when ihis matter was under consultation that Lincoln came up and drove off Prevost, aiid 
fo.i!jht the celebrated battle of Siono, so much spoken of in the southern country. 

But suppose that John Ruth dge could have subjected them to the terms which the gentle- 
man has censured — for he i.s not only a superior lawyer to sit in judgment on everybody elkc'a 
law knowledge, but it appears he is a military man, though I never hf ard of it bef re — i>up- 
pose that John Rutledge'had stipulated, as far as he cou'd stipulate, that the people of Chiilea- 
ton should be remitted to British protection as long as they observed their parole, was it any- 
thing more than his own countryman, General Lincoln, did, on the 22d of IVIay of the follow- 
inz year.' Genei-al Lincoln was severely censured for his act ; but it was done from feelings 
of humanity. He could have evacuated the city of Ch rleston ami saved his army, as Wash- 
ington dill at Phd-idelphia ; but, instead of that, he asre el to stand by the houses of the women 
and children in Ch.trleston at ail hazards, and run the risk of the censure pronounced on hira 
by military men. He capitulated ; and what were the terms of the capitulation? That the 
militia f hould be under British protection, and should not be disturbed, in person or property, 
as long as they observed their parole. 

That was the act of Lincoln. He could do no more. The military men who were under 
his command were subj>ct to be exrhangerl as prisoners of war. The sc. ator has gone oni of 
hia way to prono<ince a judgment against Rutledge to which his own countrymai^ has been 
actually liabln. I will give you an incident to show the dilference between the launtinz injustice 
and malignity which prevail now and the chivalry whi h prevai ed then. When they came to 
the terms of capitulation, Lincoln, with the proud spirit of a military man, i^ sisied that he 
should leave Charleston beating the American mareh, with his colors unfolded, his tl ig furled. 
Clinton told him, " No, sir ; we have redrctd you to our own terms, and we i.iund to dcgr.-.de 
you ; you are lelie's. and deserve none of these honors at our hands " 

When Yorkiown was taken, who was delegated to prcrrihe the terms of capitu'ation ? 
John Laurens, of whom it has be en eaiij that a daring cour>>ge was the least of his aecompiieh- 
nieuis, and un ex'-.e^s oi' ii n..^,..-: ci :aul:. Wiie.. Liu;e:id svas caiied ip n ly General' 



I? 



Washington, who behaved on that occasion with a delicacv and propriety which history and 

foetry ought to commemorate, he told Laurent, " Sir, as your city Purrpnrlered to Clinton, 
delej;ate to you the authority to prescribe the terms on whirh this surrender shall be made." 
Cornwallis said to him, "These aie hard terms to require us to go cut with fo'ded coU rs, and 
to beat the Turk's march — a neutral march." Laur<ns said, "There shall nnt he a riot of uni 
or a crof s of a / in the terms of capitulation at Yorktowti which was not obs' rved at Charles- 
ton." To make it more delicate to Line* In, on whom the shade of censure hud somewhat 
passed for his conduct at the sie^e of Charleston, Laurens said that it was proper to select " 
Lincoln to receive the, sword from Cornwallis, as he had surrendered the sw.>r(l to Clii'ton. 
You will ste him in the foreground of the picture in 'he r^tundo. There w;is chivalry, sir — a 
chivalry peculiar to the days in which it was exhibited. Is such conduct as that to iie under 
the censure of a rhetorical fabricator at this day .' It is hard to bear — it is u» just in it-elf 

Now, sir, 1 have done with these trpics 1 have not vindicated the history of Snuth Caro- 
lina. 1 ask the Senate to bear me testimony that I have not gone ii to this mater with a view 
to vindicate her. She does not need it. Adoptitig; the !ang:u»e-e of Daniel Wel)ster. I may say : 
*' There is South Carolii a ; there she standt^ ; she ^pe<lks for herself'; she needs no eulogy." 
She cannot be injured by the detraction of one who is uuder an itifluence not of justice, truth, 
or honor 

Having finished with these thrusts at the constitution of South Carolina, and at her history 
and character, I come now to another matter in relation to myself. He snys th:it I hav-^ .^luch 
a proclivity to error in my st^-tisiics that 1 have as many woids of erior a» I iitier. What a 
wholesale assertion is that ! S range to say, I resirted to no stati>tics at a:l on Ihi" occasion to 
which he alluded. When I interrupted the senator from New ilampshiie, [Mr. Hale ] I 
had on my table returns from the Chaileston custom-house. 1 alluded to them in j^eneial terin3, 
to prove what he cannot dispute : that the slave trade was carried on in noithern, and En>j;lish, 
ami Scotch vessels; that the profits of it redounded to them; and that, wlun the slave trade 
was opened, it i;ave them the regulation of comoierce. The veneralile grai dlaiher of my friend 
from Virginia, [Mr. Mason,] in the convfniinn, had insetttd into the constitution provision 
that a Uvo-thirds vote of Congress should be necessary for the passage of any measure to regu- 
late commerce. 

1 say here, that for South Carolina and Georgia it was a shbr^-si^hted policy when they 
gave up the regulation of commerce to the navigation interest, in consideiation of their bavin? 
the slave trade remain open t'ntil I8li8, with the certainty before them that Ntvv England 
mamly gained the profits of '.hat trade. If the sm <f ih>-, slave trade is to be 'input' d to any- 
body, li t It be imputed to the hand that took the child from under the tree, sep noted it frona 
its mother in Africa, and brought it to this country under circumstances tl at, 1 confess now, 
are i-hocking. If I were to dwell on .-ome of the circumstances of that slave trade, as I have 
heard th^m from Africans, and believe tliem to be true, they would shock the Senate. The 
slave trade threw its profis i?. to INew England. As a fiend of mine fiom Si.uih Caiolina 
[Mr. Keitt] said in ihe other House, if INew England will to-day come hrck und return all 
the money she has got out of the slave trade, we will .strike a ba ance with her and let her buy 
them ; but she wmi d rot take them. This time, when the coiulitiim of the slave is be ter than 
it ever was at any other, is the very occasion when they are making war upon t'.e institution. 
It is the rommon practice in my distriet — I cannot answer beyond my neightmr.s — to give the 
laboring hand.s three and a half pounds of good bacon every week, and as n.uch bread as they 
can eat. It is the interest of their owners to clothe them. They aie a happy, contented, in- 
telligent, and reformed people. 

but, sir, the senator undertakes to say that, because 1 have advocated here the constitutional 
rights of the South and the equaliiy of ibeee S ides, I subj cted n.yself to an imputation which 
I shall not read myself, it bears his own haidiwork. Mr. Secret ry, i hes: your pardon for 
asking you to read such a thing as this ; but it is your duty, not mine. 

The Secretary read tlie following extract from Mr. Sumner s speech of May 10 : 

" But, before entering upon the argument, I must say something of a general character, 
particularly in response to what has fallen fn m senatora who have raised themselves to emi- 
rence on this fl'ior in rhampioifhip of human wrongs; I nii^an the senator from South Caro- 
lina, [Mr Butler.] and the senator from lllinnis, [Mr. Douglas,] who, mo .gh unlike as Don 
Q,uixole and Sancho Panzi, yet, like this couple, .^allv forth together in the smiie advrnture. 
1 regret mucli to miss the eider senator from his seat; but the cause ogiinst which he has run 
a tilt with such activity of an mosily, demands that the opportunity of exposing him should 
not be lost; and it is fur the cause that I sneak. The senator from South Carolina has read 
many books of chivalry, and believes him-'elf a chivabous knight, with sentiinenis of honor 
and couiage. Of course he hcS ch' sen a mistress to whom he has niade his vow.<; and who, 
though ugly to oih(rs, is always loveK to him; though polluted in the sight of the world, la 
chaste in his sigh — 1 mean the harlot s'averj'. For her his tongue is always p ofuse in 
words. Let her be impeached in character, or any proposition maile to shut her out fiom the 
fxten-ion of her wanioni'.es-s, and no extravagance of manner or hardihood of assertitm is 
then too great for this senator. Ihe phr< nsy of Don Q,uixote in behalf of his viench, Dulci- 
nea del Toboi-o, is all surpassed. The asserted rights of slavery, which shock equality of all 
kinds, are cloaked by a fantastic claim of equality. If the slave States cannot enjuy what, in 



13 

mockery of the prpat fothfrs of ihr repu'ilir, ho miFnnmrs rqiiality under the consiitndoii— i» 
other words, the full pou'<!r in the iiiitKi' ol 'I orriiorip ■ to C"ni[)('l li>!|i>w-ii en tn uip.iiil mil.t o 
•eparatf IhimIihikI ai il wj p, and to s( II jittjp rhitdr' ii m the iimt on hlock — ihm, sir, ihr cliiv- 
alrir spnnlir will cotidiiri the St ito of South Curoljnn <>»i of the Union ! Hemic knighi! ex- 
alted scnuior ! a s(C<in(l Mohcn cnnu' for u accond cxnduH ! 

'■ Hut not coti'enl with this poor rnrnare, which wc iiuve brcn twice told was ' mrnsnred,' 
the senator, in the nnrcH rained chivalry of his n:itiirr, hrs iin'eiliikcn to apf)ly opprolriuim 
words to tho-»e who difTcr fr.im him on this floor. Fit" rnllH th- rn ' srctintnl nnd fnnntirnt;' 
and opposition to the ueurptitmn in Kansns lie df-nunnres as 'an unculrnlatin!; faiuti ism.' To 
be sure, these rhurgCH lark all i;rai(! of oriu'iriiility, and all hcntimcnt nf t.u'h; but the ndvni- 
turons senator dots not hc^■Ila'e He is the uncurnpromisMic, ui blushing rcprcK* ntativc on 
this fl.'or of a (ing'^avl seclionaUsm, which now dimiiiicrs over ilie r< public; and y»i, with a 
ludicrous ignorance of hid own position — unable to see himself as others s<>e hiin — or with an 
effronury which even his white head ought net to |>rottrt from rel uke, he app'its to ihose 
here wlio resist his sectionalism liie very epiihet which dtsij^naies Inrnself. 'I'he men who 
strive to bring back the Kovernincrit to its original policy, when freedom, and no' slavery, was 
national, while slaveiy, ami not freedom, was ^ccllOIlal, he arraigns as seclional Thi» will 
not do. li involves too great a perverssioii of terms. 1 tell ihat Sfoator that it is to himself, 
and to the '(■rg:'.i.ization' of which he is the 'commitied aiivoculc,' ihai ihi.'< epithet be'firitrs 1 
now fasten it upon thf m For my.'^elf, I care little for names ; but since the queNtion has been 
raised here, I i ffi m that the refu^iican party of the Union is in no just sense seclional, but, 
more than aiiy oiher pnny, »i«/ioii(j7 ; and that it now goes forth to dislodge from ti.e high 

E laces of the govirnnieni the lyiannical sectionalism of which the senator from fcouih Caro- 
na IS one of the maddest z- alots." 

Mr. BUTLER. Now, Mr. President, how any man who has not been excluded from society 
eonid use suf.h an illustration on this floor, 1 know » ot 1 do not s^e how any man cuuld 
obtain the consent of his own €■ ns-ience to ri.e in the presence of a taliery of I dirs, imd 
give to slavery the personification of a " niistri s.h," and say that I lov( d her becau-e she waa 
a " harlot." I beg pardon for repeating it. Whut, in the name of justice and decency, could 
have ever led that man to use such lanjruage.' That is thi; l,ingu;;ge of Cleon. It is a some- 
what remarkab! thing tha\ in thn speech which I deliverC'i here in reply to the senator 
from New L-iampsliire, 1 nscil the word "slavery" but in one par'grapii, and that was in 
response to a remark of his speking of the Supreme Court as the citadel of slavery. 1 
rebuked him. 1 se.id I w.uld rather regard that court as the defender or as the promontory of 
the consiitution ; and that he was at too great a distanee cer to leach it liy any arrow which 
he could discliarge from his bow. Seciionalism was ik t in the s[e<ch it.'^e f. When i spoke, of 
individuals in a particular section, 1 did not speak in terms which wouM imply or cor.vey 
the ie'ea that I meant the public of the slaveholding ai d noii-i-laveholdinj; Spates. 1 confined 
it to that section who are . ufTciing at this time, 1 hope to a lirniteil exiem, a:,d who are burn- 
ing their fi.cs un il they will be reduced to the ceusiic as-hes of disappointment and di.-cia«:e. 
I did no! s] e k of sectionalisjm in any otlier point of view. Sir, there are men on thi.~ fl >or 
who 1 believe honestly diller from me. 1 would not make any per.^on.il allusion to th< m. 
Fur from wiiiei.iiig this controversy, the object of my speech was to apiease pub'ic sentiment. 
In the ctiurse of it 1 ventured to say, what 1 had never sail bttVre, ih it the man doi s not 
live who could look wiihuut coneein at the confiequencts of a seporjiion of tliese States 
efl'ected in blood. 1 remarked that I would not s.iy there was not iotelligence en' Uih ulti- 
mately to form new governments and make Ihtm a union of ccnfeJeraciesi. Sir, in 'hat 
gpeech 1 attempted to thr )w oil upon the troubled water.s. My friends in some mecisure 
blamed me dr the tone of my remarks. The so-c.illed reply was already in the sap, the 
poiionous sap behi..d, and ihe S: nator had to use his .-pecch a.s a conduit to pour it c u' on 
me and on the country, when he had less occasion than was presented by any jp>ech which 
I ever before made. Anybody who says we are incapal'le of pre.<ervii'g free iii.-iirniona I 
should be incline 1 to consider a slanderer on free institutions : but I win never agree to live 
in any government that has not som ■ operative and enforcible provisi.ns of a con.«titu'ion to 
preserve my rights. If the governm<nt were la it formerly was, ^ruth Carolina and Massa- 
chusetts having a common interest, do yru think the senator couhl arise as nn adversary to be 
applauded by his people.' There was a time, sir, when his [reople would have disgraced him 
for that very sp cch. At this d ly, I do iint say tnty will acquit my kinsman ; I dare say ihey 
will not ; but the time is coming when tht re will be but one opinion — ihat that is the i oat 
mischievous speech which has ever been delivered m this cou itry, and has involved more 
innocent persons. If the contest goes on upon such issues as it makes, blood must fllow. 
1 do not look on any such .'■cenes with pleasure. I have not temper for them ; thmi.h when 
a young man 1 might, perhaps, not have been indisposed to embark in the hazards of 
contests. 

Whilst upon this point, I may remark that Josiah Quincy, for whom I have here'ofi re had 
a gieat resp ct, says 'h" senntf^r h '9 not gone a hair's breaith beyond the line of duty and 
truth. After my cxplanationt- here I hardly think h will sny so. He is the on'y mm of high 
respectability whom I have yet e<en or hei.d mrke such a derlaraton. He mad- 't. too, 
with a reproach that I wa.^ sorry to see esct pe from such a man. He r^aid. alluding to the 



nit 



fracas in the Senate-house, not in the Senate, that it is only a part of tliat tribe who carry 
bowie-knives and revolvers. Sir, [ never wore a secret weapon in my liTe. 1 am not goins< to 
discuss the fact that I have used open weapons ; and that is the only way 1 choose to deal, 
but that is not the way we can get them to deal with us. 

Unfortunately, I have had scenes of that kind which I have regretted all my life to some 
extent. 1 am mortified to hear such a man as GLuincy making a charije upon a whole section, 
when I question if there is a southern man in this house with a pi»tol or bowie-knife in his 
pocket. He has gone out of the way gratuitously to say that we are of a " breed " who wear 
iheni as a part of our dress. I am sorry to see -such things creeping into the public mind. 
They mortify me ; they annoy me. But now 1 come to the resolutions of Massachusetts. I 
ask that they be read. 

The Secretary read them as follows : 

COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS— IN THE YEAR 1856. 

RESOLVES concerning the recent assault upon the Hon. Charles Sumner, at Washington. 

Resclved b^J the Senate and House of Representatives of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, That 
we have received wiih deep concern information of the recent violent assault, committed in the 
Senate chamber at Washington, upon the person of the Hon. Charles Sumner, one of our sen- 
ators in Congress, by Preston S. Brooks, a member of the House of Representativrs from 
South Carolina — an assault which no provocation could justify — brufal and cosvardly in itself 
— a gross breach of parliamentary privilege — a ruthless attack upon ihe liberty of speech — an 
outrage of the decencies of civilized life, and an indignity to the Commonwealth of JVlassachu- 
sefs. 

Resolved, That the legislature of Massachusetts, in the name of hrr fiee and enlightened 
peop'e, demands for her representatives in the national legislature entire freedom of speech, and 
will uphold tiiem in the proper exercise of that essential rinht of Araeii"an ciiizens. 

Resolved, That we approve of Mr. Sumner's manliness and courage in his earnest and fear- 
less declaration of free principles, and his defence of human rights and free Territory. 

Resolved, That the legislature of Massachusetts is imperatively called upon by the plainest 
dictaies of duty, from a decent regard to the rights of her citizens, and rtspect for her character 
as a sovereign State, to demand, and the legislature of Massachusetts hereby does demand, of 
the ratiot^al Congress, a prompt and strict investigation into the recent assault upon Sonator 
Sumner, and the expulsion by the House of Representatives of Mr. Brooks, of South Carolina, 
and any other member concerned with him in said assault. 

Resolved, That his excellency the governor be requested to transmit a copy of the foregoing 
resolves to the President of the S nate, and Speaker of the House of Representatives, and to 
e?ch of the senators and membors of the House of Representatives from this Commonwealth, 
in the Co: gress of the United States. 

House OF Representatives, May 29, 1856. — Passed. 

CHARLES A. PHELPS, Speaker. 
In Senate, May 3D, 1856.— Passed. 

ELIHU C. BAKER, President. 
Approved, May 31, 1856. 

HENRY J, GARDINER. 
Secretary's Office, Boston, May 31, 1856. 
1 certify the foregoing to be a true copy of the original resolves. 

Atttest: FRANCIS DeWITT, 

Secretary of the Commomcealth. 
Mr. BUTLER. These resolutions give rise to more serious reflection than aiiything which 
has occurred to me in my time. I have been in the Senate for ten years, and thi^ is the first 
occasion that I have ever seen one of the sovereign States of the Union taking cognizance of 
matters which occurred in Congress with a view to influence the judgment of Congress in rela- 
tion to one of their mcmber-% This is the first orcasion of the kind in the history of the coun- 
try- It has been done from an ex parte view of the .subject ; for it is now very apparent that 
the resolutions of Massachusetts were introduced and passed without regard to the evidence. 
These re-olutions anticipated and asserted what may not be true — what the public may not 
think true — wh.it the Senate may not think true — what the House of Representatives may not 
think true ; and yet the sovereign State of Mas.sachuaetts, before there was any evidence, in- 
dicted my relative upon rumor— a measure which would have tak' n Stafford "to the gallov/s. 
What ! sir ; indict a man in the langua;^e of these resolutions upon the rumor of newspapers .' 
These resolutions — I sa^/ it more in sorrow than in anger — betray a temper an! precipitimcy of 
judgment that do uot lo.)k like having a regird to that dignity which is associated with justice. 
I shall speak respectfully. So far as I have spoken of Massachusetts hitherio, no excption can 
be taken ; but when I speak of Massachuseits now, it must be of Massachusetts as she has 
sent forth these resolutions — under ih- influ<infe of a feeling which pervades her — under the in- 
fluence of a sentiment which denied Daniel Webster the right to speak in Faneuil Hall, and 
ihrev/ off the coffin of Lincoln because he had fallen in performing his professional duties in the 



15 

cauMofhia countiy. Boston now is nottJm Boston tliat pho was whnn Hancock wrote, and 
A'lam-^ apnkc, and Otis thoUKhi, anil Warren feil. Tliey W(julil not rec.ogniae her. fShe is no 
more ih- same. Yet, frum that very liot-bed of hitter freline to the South, and cppecially to 
South Oatolina, have I to look for the ftelin<r« which ilii'tatcd tlirse resolutions. I have to meet 
an indictment — for what.' It is said that the li'eity of spench ha.s been violated. Upon that 
point I intend to deliver some remarks which, whcthrr they he correct or not, I shall throw out. 
Uiir ancestors were a people of hardy morality. Generally, when they Rpokc, they Hooke 
directly from the lieait. Kucli a thinjs; as prioiio^i spneche-i beforehand, or havin:; them printed 
without bcina; uttered in the Senate, was unhcwd of in their day. Thty wore men who stood 
on their lejjs and spoke out. I'hey had hearts and mouth.s. They did not report to the apoli- 
aiices of paper and printintj before they brouglit their speeches here. If the senator from Mas- 
s:icliupeti9 were present, and would answer me, I would put the question to him, " Was not 
that speech of \ ours prin'ed and (lubiished before you spoke it in the Senate of the United 
Stntes.'" What i.s the meaning of that provision of the constitution which suys that a seiiator, 
era member of the House, for any speech or deb,.te in either house, e^hili not be questioned in 
any other place? Does it mean to give the Congre-.s of the United States the powe.-- of deciding 
v/hat IS privilege without the courts questioning it.' If so, it goes far beyond the settled doc- 
trine in Great Britain at this day, which was maintained by Chief Justice Denman, in the case 
of Stockdale vs. Han.^ard ; and that case has much to do with the matter now under considera- 
tion. Hansard had undertaken, under the Ruihority of Parliament, to publish a book which 
containrd a libel. Without such license or j)rivilege, all ngreed that lie was responsible. The 
E'''gli.<h House of Commons said that, having granted him the license, it was their priviUge. 
Chief Justice Denmm took cognizance of the case, on the broad ground that the courts could 
determine u hat was privi'ese under the constitution of England. He said : "As a common- 
law judge, I will show the Parliament whether 1 am not capable of deciding on my resp'Xisibility 
as one of the great deoartmnnts of this government. Can it be maintained" — and it is one of 
the most eloquent decisions I ever read — " that the House of Commons, by claiming a privilege, 
shall thcrrby appropriate it to themselves, and screen a villain from the consequence of his 
libel .'" The judge said th a although by the law of Parliament newspapers were pas.'^ed through 
the country under the frank of members without paying postage, that privilege did not give them 
the right to make use of a newspaper as a libel. He uses the strong expression: "God for- 
bid that Parliament >hould aflord such a pretext for doing wrong." 1 say the same thing now. 

Will you tell tnc that a member rising here and handing a speech to the reporter, and telling 
him 10 print it, comes within the purview of the cnnttitution? Has he uttered words in debate .' 
Will yoD tell me th^u a memler who has made a speech of five sentences may append to it a 
newspaper like the Tribune, which has libelled me, and has the right to send through th.e post 
offices of this government, and have folded by the persons employed in the foiding-room 
at the public expense, into my daughter's parlor, that which would cost him his life if he told 
it to me.' Has it c>ime to this, that a senator upon thi.s floor can claim Juch an extensive 
privilege', under the l.iw of Parliament, that he can send off, by the twenty thousand, speeches 
to E'liiland and to the four corners of the globe, where I am not known, aod then claim pro- 
tection upon the ground that he has a privilege which precludes him froin being questioned 
elsewhere for words spoken in debate.' 

Sir, the difTcrerice is an obvious one.' Perhaps not more than five hundred or a thousand 
people heard the .senator on the occasion when he assailed me ; and I venture to say that, of 
the number who were present and knew me, not one believed a word of v/iiat he said It is a 
ditftrei t thing when he has printed a package of twenty thousand of the docuiv.cnts, franked 
them, and sent them to England, where, 1 suppose, he will be highly praised. He will be fed 
witii the oil which kindles English fires, to encourage him to walk in the light of his path. 
If I were to go to Etrgiand, they might point at me and ark, 'Is that the man so monoma- 
niaeal in regard to slavery that he cannot tell the truth.' " I am not accustomed to make com- 
parisons, but I will say that there is not a parent or a husband on this floor who can approve the 
language of that senator. Though I may hive bitter enemies here — no doubt I have some, but 
I do not see why I have incurred iheir enmity — I venture to say that I do not think a single 
rcati on this floor would, if he were put on hia oath, say that he believed what the senator said 
ofmc. WhfD spread abroaii in the form of a libel it becomes of a very oifferent character. 

I say that this privilege under the constitution is the subject of judicial inquiry. The courts 
may say where privilege ends and where libel begins. He has be3n guilty of a libel. I know, 
sir, how sacred is the lii.erty of speech. I know what has been said by Mr. Erskine on t'.iis 
siibjec — !iis language has often been praised for its beauty — in the celebrated trial agiinst 
Tom P.iine. Mr. Krskine quoted language which he supposed had been used by Lord Cliest- 
erfie'.d. Lord Kenyon said to him : 

" Lord Kenyon. That very speech which did Lord Chesterfield so much honor is suppose J 
to have been written by Dr. Johnson. 

" Mr. Erskine. G'nilemcn, 1 believe it W3S so, and I am much obliged to his lordship for 
giving me a far higher nufhority for my doctrine ; for, thougii Lord Ch'S'erficM was a man of 
grcf.t wi', he was undou'.'tcdly fjr inferior in leartnng, and what i.s more to the purpose, in 
monarcliical opinion, to thu celebrated writer to whom my lord has now delivered the work 
by his authority. Dr Johnson then says " — *• 



16 

Gentlemen may avail themselves of this, if they choose, when I come to another part of this 
matter. Dr. Johnson says, m the language put in the mouth of Lord Chesterfield : 

" One of the greatest blessings we enjoy — one of the greatest blessings a people, my loids, 
can enjoy — is liberty ; licentiousness is ihe alloy if liberiy ; it is an ebullition — an excrescence : 
it is a ^;peok Ufion the eye of (he political body, but whii h I can never touch bui with a gentle, 
with a irerabiing hand, lest 1 destroy tue body — lest I injure the eye upon which it is apt to 
appear. 

" There is such a connexion between licentiousness and liberty that it is not easy to correct 
the one without dangerously wi unding the other; it is extremely hard to distinguish the true 
limit betvveen them ; like a changeable silk, we can ea.-ily see theie are two different colore, but 
we cannot easily discover where the one ends, or where the other begins." 

In a subsequent part of this celebrated forensic speech, delivered by Lord Erskine, he goes on 
to show what is the liberiy of speech, and what ia its limit. He says, by way of illustration, 
what is exactly opposite to this case : 

" I expect to hear, in answer to what 1 am now saying, much that will offend me. My 
learned fiiend " — 

1 do not call the senator " my learned friend ;" I make this periphrasis on that point — 

" My learned friend, from the difficulties of his situation, which i know from experience 
how to feel for very sincerely, may he driven to advance propositions which it may be my 
duty, with much freedom, to reply to ; and the law wnl sanction that Ireedom; but will not 
the ends of justice be completely answered by my exercise of that right in terms that are 
ddcent, and calculated to expose us defects.' or will my argument suffi r, or will public justice 
be impeded, because neither private honor and justice, nor puuiic decuru^n, woula enduie my 
telling my very learned fi it. nd, because I difT^r from him in opinion, that he is a fool, a liar, and 
a scoundrel, in the face of the court? " 

If the senator had said, in respectful language, "We have been adversaries on this sub- 
ject; I differ from you; 1 thmk you have been gui ty of great errors which deserve the 
censure of a pailiameutury speaker; and 1 intend to pronounce a censure, believing ihat I 
am right and you are wrong; 1 will detect you in the fallacies of your history; I will 
detect you in the errors of your law; I will expose those errors" — he would have had a 
right to do this, and in as strong language as he chose ; but when he soid, alt ost in so many 
words, that my procliviiy to error was such that 1 deviated from the truth in all these par- 
ticulars, it is a libel in ihe vtry language of Mr. Erskine. It' he were indicted fur a libel to- 
morrow, could he claim his [irivilege under the conttitut on, and would the courts be pre- 
cluded from neciding the question whether it was a libtl or not.' There is no one, perhaps, 
who has a higher ideal admiration for the liberty of speech and the libe.ty of the press than 
I have. 

The liberty of spepch and of the press is the great conservative clement of a republic ; it is 
to the poliiical what fire is to the matt rial worlJ — a subservient and ^ fflient mimsttr, when 
under the control of pruderce and intelligence ; but when umhecked and unregulaied, a con- 
suminj; foe, withering and blasting everything along lis pathway of ruin. Render freedom 
of speech tributary to the proprieties, uecenciCo!, ai d restraints of social life, and you may 
crown it with all the ministiiis and supremacies of intellect and libc^rty ; but release it from 
them, and it becomes a b:ind ami maotientd giant of evd, tearing down the bulwnrks of social 
Oider. ant! utsei rating the very sanctuary ot republican liberty. Wiiat wcuhi yon ihink of a 
reckless man who shouUt set fire to his own hou^ic, or shou d go about claimins; the privilege 
of throwing his fire wherever ho cnuld anion" the mo-t combusdijle maieri .Is, <ind say He 
had the right to do so on the gn und that he was a fieeman, and could do ts he pleased. 
Away with such liberiy ! Liberty that is worth anything must be )i' the harness of tne law. 

Lii erty of speech and liberty of the press must have two restraints. The first is the hi-hest 
whii h will always govern a c uss olnnn who cannot violate it — the otdigaiions of honcr, de- 
cency, and justice. Another nstraint upon licent:ousiies.s is, that a m m may publish and 
speck what he pleases wito a knowledge that iie is ameiiaii'e to the irit uniUs of ihe law for 
what he: has done. Congres.s cannot pass ay statute to say that men .shall not write against 
religion, or against the government, < r a^.;ainst individuals. Neither can Congress pass a law, 
nor cyn any Slate pass a law, depriving the triburals or the country of the right of saying 
whether yu have i^one beyond tlie limits, of liberty, and have used your ptwer, under that 
name, wilh criminal recklessnpss, with a licentious indifference to the fctlings ot individuals, 
and the consequences upon society. I do not wish to live in any community wliere it is other- 
wise. 

Ihc press is losing its power, and it ought to lose it ; for it is now b( ginning to be an engine 
of private revenge and individual expression, instead of being a rejiponsible organ of public 
opinion, buppose I ^vere Kr go to Mew Yoik and indirt one of the editors there wiiom I could 
name tor the nicst atrocious iibel ihat has ever been uttered upon the South. 1 will not name 
the editur ; but he has uttered a sentiment akin to one which has been expressed by the senator 



17 

from Mnfsachusrtta. I saw in a New York pappr — I have alliiJcd to it hprrtofore — a eiafe- 
mfiit (hi>t the s. iiihrrn SinKsare too tVfbli- ami weak to ial;e any fpait in a var — iliat ull they 
ean (Jo is to lakn charge oi Ihrir nrjjrocH ! It s-aiil th:i' if'a w.ir shail I take [ilace hetwreo Ivng- 
latid and the United Si«tes, ihe Krifj'ish (li ei would only > nvc lo go to the rnyes of the (IhnKa- 
pcnke, and the. i (Teininalf. ii aslri-e would be k(|>t ut home. FiCiy Ihousand tduven, inured to 
toil, C"uM be iTiusiired into service, aiu) ihey would havo ihf f ower t" put iheir mn-tcis to thf 
eword ; and when the derlaration of peace should come, the result would l)c the fre» dnm of the 
slaves and the proscription of the masfPis ! Suppi se I shouid j<o mlo the conimm ity where 
this libel was uttered, and indicia man for such a sentiment as thin ; what would be the conne- 
quenre in the present state of public opinion? It is idle — worte than idle — toialk about that as 
a remedy. 

Libfrty ofihepiess! Sii, ihat ninn has franked twenty thousand of his speeches; and 
some of them, if 1 am not misinformed, were [irinied long before it was delivered. To bring 
him within the privileges of Parliament is a mockery — a peifsct mockery. 

Now, Mr. Prcsider t, I approach another most painful pait of this case, and I come to it in 
no bad ten^prr ; for, God kiiovvi^, if my heart could be read, (here is no one whirwould sooner 
than myselt have nveittd tiie state ot things which now exi.sts, if 1 could, consistently with 
my honor, and the honor of the gpnileman t'l whom I shall allude. The resolutions of Mas- 
sachusetts undertook, before any evidence wo.s hiard, to pronounce sentence on Mr. Brooks. 
Sir, I will tell you wlio Mr. Brooks is, and why he felt so deeply in reference to these abomi- 
nable libels. I do not allude to him n.iw as my hereditaiy kinsman ; I think that is the .'imall- 
eti view to lake of the matter ; but I am his constituent. I live in "Ninety-six" — a district 
through which, if you pass, you will read upon the tombstones epiiaphs which would reproach 
him for tame and ignominious submission lo wrong and to insult 

He has as proud and intelligent a coistituoncy as are to be found in any part of the globe. 
1 am hi- constiiuf nt. But more than that, he has worn the epaulet and the ew .rd ; lie has 
marched under the Palmetto banner, and liis coi.mtrymen have awarded to him a sword for his 
pooij coi'diict in ths war yith Mexico. Th:it sword was in some measure commit'ed to him 
lh.1t he might use it whf:n occasion required, to maintain the honor and the dignity of his State. 
When he heard of rhi.'? speech first, and read it afterward.^, this yfiingman, in passing down 
the ftreet, heard but one sentiment, and it was that his State and his blood had been in- 
sulted. He cculd not go into tlie drawing room, or parlor, or into a rradiog-room. without the 
Btnet commentary repronchins him. Whcrf-ver he went the qntstion was esked, " Has the 
chivalry ot Sooth Carolina escaped, and is this to be a tame submiaaion ?" What advice I 
wouid have given him I do not now urideriake to say. 

But, sir, when thii was said to this gentleman wherever he went, he felt that if something 
was not done he could not face his constituent.? without losing liis usefulness, and without 
there being a taint on hi.s honor and on his courage. He may have leen mistaken in some 
respects. His coming into the Senate-hou.''e was no option of his. When he formed his de- 
termination, as i am informed — and I have kept aloof from conver.«ation with him — I judge 
from the evidence he had no purpose to profane the Senatc-hnuse. I say the Senate-hou-^^e had 
betD profanpd l;efa'e. I had njiher to-m'jrrow lake ten blows inflic ed on my body than have 
the gas of the rheti^rician poured out upon my character and S'.aie. 

The senator from Massachusetts chote to make his place here one from which to assail the 
history and reputation of South Carolina, and to assail aM absent con-iituent of the gentleman 
who has taken redress into his own hands. In ^uch a condition of things who c u!d be placed 
in a situatinn more diffi u't.' Sun ly, Mr. Pr'^-!dent, son eihing is to be pardoneJ to the feel- 
ings of a rr.nn actire under se: sibijity, and under the dictates of high l^onor. If any one was 
here, placed in a situation to fe;.! the touf.hing aj.pcal made by the -hist to Hamlet, " If thou 
hast nature in thee, bear it ni t," he was the m n. Now, I ask the Secretary to read the ex- 
tract which I have marked in the book which 1 send to him, and I do not intend to say where 
It cornea from till it is read 

The Secretary read as follows : 

" Do not believe that I am in^nilcating opinions tending 'o disturb the peace of society. On 
the contrary, they are the priiiciples that can pressrve it. It is m'>re dangerous for the laws to 
give security to a m in disponed to commit ouir ges on the persons of hi.s feIlow-i itizens, than 
to aiithorizf those who must otherwise mc^t irreparable njury to defend themselves at every 
hazard. Men of eminent ta'entK and virtue, on whose exertions in perilous times the honor 
and happint-aa of tiieir country roust depend, v^ill always be liable to be degraded by every 
daring ini.-creant, it they cannot defend tiiemselves from personal insult and outrage. Men of 
this description must always feel that to submit to degradation and di.shonor is impossible. 
Nor is this felling c mfined to men of that eriiinent grade. We have thous.inds in our country 
whoposs'ss this spiiit ; and without them we should soon deseivedly cease to exi^t r.s an in- 
dependrnt nation. I respeci the laws of my ci iintry, and revere the precepts of nur holy reli- 
gioii ; ! should shudd<r at shedding human blood; 1 would praciise moderotion and for- 
bear in'e to avoid so terribif a calao'ity ; yet, 'li'.uld I fver be iJrivcn to that imp.issable point, 
where degradation and disgrace begin, may this arm bhrink palsied from its socket if I fail to 
defend my own honor." 



18 

Mr. BUTLER. Who uttered that sentiment? It ia the sentiment of a gentleman whose 
spe<;chps have always commended him to me. It is a sentiment worthy of the ancient days 
of Boston when Dexter spoke. This is a northern man speaking ; and I adopt his language. 
I say with him, that when Ihings "tend to that im pas able point where degradation and dis- 
grjce b'-gin, may my arm shrink pal.sied Crom its socket if I fail to defend'my own honor!" 

Sir, ihtit sentiment was uttered at a time when clergymen confined themselves to the pulpit, 
and prtnched against crime and vice ; when they did not use the pulpit as a recruiting station 
to issue Sharpe's rifles, and to mingle in all tiie bitter strife of the forum and the Agora. It 
was uitered when Boston knew how to respect the feelings of others. I concur in all that ia 
said by IVir. Dexter. I deprecate blood and violence. I will not utter all that my heart 
prompts me to say, for fear of encouraging young men ; but this I will say, that no son of 
mine ehould ever submit to insult without satisfaction 

[ The honorable senator, at this point, yielded the floor at the suggestion of Mr. Clay, on 
whose motion the Senate adjourned.] 



Friday, June 13, 1856. 

Mr. BUTLER. Mr. President, whilst I am indebted to my friend from Alabama, [Mir. 
Clay,] for asking that this debate should be adjourned over until to-day, I regret very much 
that 1 did noi finish my remarks yesterday ; for 1 do not wish to detain the Sen.ite on this 
subject longer than justice and propriety, and a regard to the questions involved, require. 

Of course, Mr. President, it is obvious that [ have become involved in this controversy in 
such a way as to make me, I hope, justly sensible to all the consequences which may grow 
out of t!ie issue — not that I hold myself at all, directly or indirectly, responsible for ttie con- 
sequences which have followed the extraordinary speech which was delivered by the senator 
from Massachusetts ; but there are questions which have grown cut of the assault that fol- 
lowed the speech, of a graver import than at one time I had thought the subject could assume. 
I think the resoluiions from Massachusetts will present questions here f r the consideraiion of 
the Senate, and, I may say, for the consideration of Congress, of a character never presented 
before. 

I had yesterday spoken of those resolutions only in one point of view — so far as they 
denounced the assault of my friend and relative, Mr. Brooks, as a violation of the freedom of 
debate. I had not ventured to speak of the resolutions as 1 intend to do before I have closed 
my remarks. From conversation with others, as well as from my own reflections, I am satis- 
fied that they are resolutions of dangerous import and precedence, utterly unknown in the 
history of this country before. I think they show that one State of the confederacy may- 
make a f arful issue in the Congress of the United Slates, under the immunities and privileges 
which by courtesy are sometimes extended to fctates, but wou'd not otherwise grow up. If it 
is in the p.ower of Massachusetts or South Carolina, or in the province of any one State in the 
Union — Wisconsin or Texas — to make such a quarrel as must neceesariiy result in an angry 
controversy that may array the difl'erent flections of the Union against each other, it is one of 
the most dangerous views in which the power of a ttate legislature can exercise the privilege 
or courtesies v/hich have been awarded to it. 

Sir, 1 have intimatud this much with a visw to show that I intend to denounce those resolu- 
tions — to denounce th'm stroiigly ; not that I denounce the individuals who passed them. 1 
hope that 1 can go higher timn the reseninienl to the mere individual who may assault the 
history of my Stat->, or who may impugn my character. This is a question that goes deeper 
and higher — very far beyond anything whicii is involve 1 in a mere personal controversy. I 
will reserve ih- se remarks on the resolutions until after I sha 1 have finished what I intended to 
say yesterday in relation to the actual state of things growing out of the speech delivered by 
the senator from Massachusetts. 

1 said yesterday that my friend, my representative, my relative — one who is associated with 
ma by m n-e ties than either of these — had taken redress in his own hands — had resorted to his 
own modd of redress. I t-aid that there were considerations conn'^cted with the occasion 
which, though they could not juniy him before a legal tribunal, would excuse any man of 
his charact-r and position, representing such constituents as he represented, and bound in some 
measure t > sympathise with the opinions of the section with which he is associated. It was 
impossi'.ile that he could separate himself from those conclusions which others might not appre- 
ciate, and 8:. me could not understand. But I say that gentleman dare not — I do not say I 
would have advieed him — but, in his estimation, he ould not go home and fare such a con- 
stituency without mcurring what is the worst of all judgments — the judgment of the country 
against a man who is placed as a s..ntinel to represent it. 

If, in the course of these prciceeditigs, and tlic events which have grown nut of the speech 
which has been made by the senator, it shall be said that Massachusetts can be justified by 
falling back on an opinion wiich will justify her scnat jrs and represert uivea, it is, 1 must be 
permitted to say, one of the unfortunate symptoms of the times, in regard to which we 



19 

have no common tribunil to decide between us. Sir, it seeins to indicate a crisis when the 
opinion of the ronstitutiu-y of one portion of th:>. confodemcy applaiida one whilut it is ready 
to cti'^ume iind put to tiie stnke another. We hive always Nuppo^ed thiit puldic opinion 
would he ris:iu ; and, sir, 1 distinguish public opinion very much from populnr prfyu(iic,e. 
Pofiular prejudice is thiit whii h would consume in i^jnonincf to-day wh U it would repent of 
to-ni()rn>w. Public opinion is the judgment of an intelligent community, not formed under 
the rxc.tpment of the mo'nent. It ia not the sentiment of an irrenponsiiile multitude; it is not 
the 8. ntinicnt of an ex parte decision ; it i8 not the judgment which can find its wny into the 
history ot the country, or which ponterity will adopt as that which ought to be pronounced 
on tht: occasion. Public opinion is the highest, the graveet, the most solemn judgment to 
which any of us csn defer. I would not pive one cent for what is called public ojiinion, if it 
depended upon ex parte views of any sut'ject. And I say thnt the resolutions which h:>ve 
been sent here from the legidature of Massachusetts are not only ex parte, but, I am sorry to 
say, that I fear their counsellors were prejudice ard midignity, even giviig their counsels 
through the darkness of ignc^rance. I do not mean ignorance so far as regards the body indi- 
vidualiy, for I have no doubt it is intelligent enough ; but I mean ignorance so far as regards 
pron;)iinciMg a judgment without understanding the facts on which that judgment ought to 
turn. 1 eay that my friend has been condemned without a hearing. He has been condemned 
by n judgment which, if suffered to go into history uncontradicted, unexamined, and unre- 
futed, wi>uld consign him to a fate which his characier does not deserve, and shall not receive 
as long as I can stand here as his friend and a.lvocate. 

But, i-ir, before I approach the constitutional and legal view of these resolutions, I must 
acqnit myself of the du'y whi'h I in some measure asstimcd yesterday evening, of presenting 
to the pulilic the circumstances under which the fracas, as it is termed, or the assault, on the 
sena'.or from Massachusetts oci urred. 

I raid that my friend and reia ive was not in the Senate when the speech was being de- 
livered, but he was summoned here, as I have learned from others. He was excited and 
stung by the street rumors and the street commentariet', and by the conversations in the par- 
lors, where even ladies pronounced a judgment ; and, &ii-, woman never fails to pronounce'a 
judgment where honoris concerned, aid it i~: always in favor of the redress of a wrmg. 1 
would trust to the instinct of wom;in upon subjects of this kind. He cou'd not go into a 
parlor, or drawing-room, or to a dinner party, where he did not find an implied reproach that 
there was an unmanly submission to an msult to his State a^d his countrymen. Sir, it was 
hard for any man, much less for a man of his temperament, to bear this. 

1 intended to reserve a commentary wliich wr-s at once made on the speech of the senator 
from Massachusetts as the most important part of my conclusion ; but I find that I can apj-ily 
it at no better tmie than this. 1 allude to the commentary which was pronounced at the lime; 
not when a controversy had arisen ; not when it was supposed that the temptations of an 
adversary, or even the public mind, had so far made an issue that he was obliged to take one 
side or the oiher; but it was pronounced by a gentleman of distinguifihed posiiioH, a sage, a 
patriot, a man who had won laurels in the field, and justly deserved to be considered the 
Ncslor of the Senate. Sir, the remarks made by the member from Michigan [V|r. Cass] 
struck me as the most consuming piece of criticism ; and I think, taking it all into consileralion, 
it would be more terrible to me than all the arguments of an advocate, and all the array that 
could be brought on one side or the other. It was the testimony of voluntary justice. 

" I have listened" — said that distingui.ihed gentlenrm, [Mr. Cass,] who had worn the sword 
and the robes of the Senate with distinction and dignity — " with «qual regret and surprise to 
tlie speech of the honorable senator from Massachusetis. Such a speech — the most un-Ameri- 
can and unpatriotic that ever grated on ears of the members of this h'gh body — as I hope 
ncTer to hear again, here or elsewhere. But, sir, 1 did not rise to mnke any comments on the 
speech of the hv.noruble senator, open as it is to the highest censure and disapprobation » 

I am not as young a man as Mr. Sumner, nor do I pretend to be in a condition to defy or 
place myself against the testimony which wo. Id put into oi)eration a current of public opinion, 
such as was pronounced by the honorable senitnr from Michigan in his place ; but, sir, I can 
say that, with my nature, I could not have sle; t that night on my pillow with such a ccijsure and 
such a criticism pronounced in the Senate of the United States. 1 8hould have been re.>dy to 
send a message to m^ke atonement in some way. I shoulcWiave wiped out, as fur as I could 
by repentance and atonement, the unmanly aggression and insult which had been offered, and v.-as 
condemned by the highest authority. I do not undertake to say what was the opinion of tliat 
senator, but I can quote from his State the most consuming judgment I ever heard pronounced. 
The sentiments expressed in the paraiiranh to which 1 allude, and in others, show that when 
tlie effervescence of poj'ular prejudice shall hav-; subsided, this case might betri'd even in 
Massachusetts itself. I should not be afraid to try it there. They are not slaves to be gov- 
erned by fanatical madness. One of the journals there, in a remarkably v/ell-*ritten article, 
which 1 adopt, says : 

•' Charles Sumner's recent speeches in the United S'ates Senate have not in any respect 
enhanced his reputation as a man, as a dehater, or as a stateRman. It is impossible, it seems 
to ufl, for any fair-minded man, who lores truth and regards honor and decency, to read these 
effusions, all reeking with falsehoods, bitterness and wrat."-., and ind*.cency, without feeling 



20 

that Massachusetts has been disgraced by an unworthy son in the Senate chamber, before the 
country and in the face of th^ world. We venture the assertion that no parallel to these 
vituperative outbursts of Sumner can be found in the annals of Con^^ress, nor in the rtcurds of 
any leais ative asstmtily in the world. Overpowering passion, madness itself, seems to have 
bereft him of his senses, and left h.m oblivious of truth and honor, of the courtesies of intelli- 
gent and dignified debate, and of the proprieties of civilizna life. 

«' We do not, we cannot, use terms too strong in relation to this matter. It is not the char- 
acter of Charles Sumner alone that is involved. Tlie fair fame of Massachusetts suffers. 
Whatever may have bfen the political errors of Massachusetts, she has ever, heretofore, been 
represented io the Senate of the United Statps, and we mii^ht also say in the House of Rtpra- 
sentativfs, liy men, statesmen — Webtter, Wmhrop, Everett, Choate, Davis, and Bates — who 
knew their rifrhts, ar)d knowing dared to mainiain, and mtsintained them with courtesy, 
dignity, and abi ity, in such a manner as to command the respect of their opponents, the ap- 
plause of their friends, and the admiration of all their countrymen " 

1 knew some of the gentlemen her?, named, and I should never be afraid to meet them in 
debate anywhere, because with them I should never afiprehend the assaults of calumny and 
slander. 1 cannot be reduced to such an issue that 1 must discount calumny and slander by 
the language of a blackguard, if it be the theory of gentlemen tnat when one uses language in 
debate iran.'-cendiiig the sphere prescrilied by propriety and juc^iice, we are to resort to the 
same mode for redress and satisfaction, I am a non-combatant; I cannot enter into a contro- 
versy with gentlemen in which they are to bandy words. 

These remaiks are not without their direction. 1 have used them to show what was the 
impression on the public mind at the time wh n theas.sault was committed. iMr. Bingham, a 
friend of Mr. Sumner I presume, says in his testimony that on hearing the speech he antici- 
pated somethirig. It was the general impression of the whole community that he deserved to 
receive a (haslisement; or, at least, that he was bound to make atonement in some way for 
the insults and the want(jmiess nf his msulta to a gentleman (as 1 hope [ am) then absent. 
This was the common sentiment pervading the public mind at Washington. 

What wus my friend to do.? Sue him.' Indict him.' If that was the mode in which he 
intended to take rediess, he had better never go to South Caiolina again. Was he to challenge 
him? That woyhl hnve been an exhibition of chivalry having no meaning. Although he 
has been upon the field, both in open war and in a private affair, 1 should be very sorry to sea 
any crisis requiring it again. A challenge would have been an advertisement to the world 
of his courage, when there was not a probability of its being triid. He would have made 
himself contemptible, and perhaps might have been committed to the penitentiary for sending a 
challenge. 

Then, what course was left to him to pursue.' Mr. Sdmner had opportunities enough to 
niske an apwiogy. God knows I could nut have resisted the admonitory criticism of the dis- 
tinguif-hed senator from iVichigan, perhaps the most imposing authority in the Senate. He 
paid no regard to him, and for a very good reason : his speech was writien, ai:d hud gone out, 
and he could not contradici what he had sent forth to the public with malice afo.ethought. 

Well, sir, what did Mr. Brooks do? It is said he sought Mr. Sumner in the >en;.te cham- 
ber It is the last place in which he wished to seek him. He would have met him in an 
open combat, on a fair field, and under a free sky, at any time. And when the legi^;lature of 
Mafsachiisetts chooses to say that his conduct is cowardly, let htr try him in any way she 
chooses [Applause] 

Mr. STUaUT. I hope the Chair will enforce the rules. I think, sir, what we have just 
witnessed has been repeated this session quite too often. If the arnenities and proprieties of 
the Seraie cannot be kept by gentlemen, ttiey should not enter its chamber. 

The Pi! EVIDENT pro t m. Does the senator desire the gallcrios to be cleared? 

Mr. SlUAElT. I snail not make any motion now; but I hope it will be understood by 
everybo''y \^hn visiis ihis chamber that the proprieties of the place shall be observed. 

The PRESIDENT }>o tempore.. Persons in the galleries will distinctly understand that if 
there be any luriher iiemonsiiation the galleries will be cleared of all except ladies. 

Mr. FE SENDEN. In jupiice to the g.dkries, I will suggest that the impression on thie 
side of the house is, that ihe disturbance came from the floor of the Senate chamber, and not 
from the galleries. I hope the galleries will not be punished for the act of persons on the 
floor. ^ 

Mr. BUTLER. Well, sir, I will go on in such a way that nobody shall be disturbed — not 
that I intend to suppress any s-in^le sentiment of mine, but I shall express it in^the severity of 
truth. 1 can tell the senator from Maine, with whom 1 have always been on good teruis, that I 
shall say nothing out of the way. 

Sir, a man ^ho occupies a place in the Senate, representing a great Commonwealth like 
Massachuse ts, or represeming any State, as one of her senators, occupies a very high posi- 
tion, from which he can send forth to the public what may affec the character of almost any 
man, except Geneial Wushmiiton, or some one upon whose chsracter the verdict of history 
has been rendered. 'Ihere- is scarcely any man who can withstand the slander which may be 
pronounced from the Senate chaii.ber of the United States. For this reason 1 would never 
look, and 1 never have looked, beyond the public position of a member here, to go into bia 



21 

private or personal character. I would nn do it, bcraiipe by no doirg I should do a wrong 
which I (oulil not redress. Even a w<>r<l csciifiinLf rny (ongue in thif chambr-r, as a pcnnior, 
mi^ht go far lo injure a man where he could iioi roi rect it. We arc in a pofiition which re- 

3 Hires hii;h cnnsitU rnMona for the rcKMJaiion of our conduct. I o^rce, thorounhly, wiih Gf'n. 
ackson, ihai the sliindercr who invdve.q third persons in dilficuhy and danger is an ini» ndi- 
ary, again.-^t whom we should gunrd more thon any one else, in a pnrlinmentnry point of view. 
I will f|U0ie General Jackson's langunge. He said : " t')ver the doors of each house of Con- 
dres*, iH letters of ffold, should be iiiscrilied the words ' the biandin r is worse thnn the mur- 
derer.'" A sinple murder is horrible, li muy tnke a single individual from Focieiy But 
when I look at the mi.«'chievous influence of Khinder, I find that it p-rvade^ a whole > ommu- 
nity ; makes war in pociety ; sets family a;j-an.st family; imiividiuil against individual ; bco- 
lion against seciion. It is ihe mo.st ownrdly mode in which a war can bv conducied. 

With the state of cfini^n to which I havculliidrd prevailing, what did Mr. BnooKs do.' Of 
course, he did not undertake to challen>;e Mr. Hummer to a fist fight, or a fti: k fi^ht, or any 
other kii.d of fi^ht. He thought Air. Siimner dc.-crved a castigation, and he undertook to 
give it to hin according to the olii-f.iahioned notion, by caning hirn. I have not heard Mr. 
Brooks detail the circumstances. I have not conversed with him in regard to the matter ; I 
take my information from the published teslirn'Oy. Mr. Brooks, not finding htm niiyv/here 
else, came to him while he was sitting in hi.s seat here, cftcr th ; Senate had adjourned. H« 
came to him in front — different froiri the statement made to the Massachusetts legl.slature. He 
was half a minute in his proenior expl.ination. He said : " Mr. SuMNtR, I have read your 
sptech. 1 have read it carefully, with as much consiileraiion, and forbeanince, and fairness 
as I could ; but, sir, I have come to punish you now for the contents of that speech, which 
is a libel on my Siaic,and on a gray-haired relative." 

Instinct would have prompted iTioslmen to ri.se immediately. Mr. Summer did rise. In the 
act of rising, Mr. Brooks struck him ai ross tue face — not, as has been ECfiresented, over his 
head, for that is not the truth, nor is it borne out by the testimony. On the second stroke the 
cane broke. It is the misfortune of Mr. Brooks to have incurred all the epithets which have 
been used in regard to an assas.-^in-like and bludgeon 'ttack, by the mere accident o*" having a 
foolish stiik, which broke, li broke again ; und it was not, as I understand, until it came 
Tery near the handle, that he inflicted blows which he would not hnve irflicied if he had an 
ordinary weapon of a kind which would have been a security ag'iinst breaking. Hi.s de- 
Bi^n was to whip him ; but the stick broke, and that has brought upon him these imputitions. 
It has sone through the countiy that Mr. Brooks struck him after he was prostrate • n the 
floor. None who ki^ow thi.s young man could entertain such an idea. I have known him 
from childhood. 1 u-^ed to have some control over him : but the scholar has become the 
master, and I suppose he would not care much about my advice now. By an hereditary tie 
our families are more closr ly united than any two witti -whom I have been acq'iainted. But 
that ib far apart from the question. Independent of his fi ial fe- liriffs for me, and his regard 
for me as his consti'nent and senator, 1 have no doubt that a personal feeling of re;iard for my- 
self, inriividuully, influence I him. 

He approached ihyt man with no other purpose than to disgrace him as fares he could ; bul 
the stick broke. After it broke, he was reduced to a kind of necessity — a coniintfency not 
apprehended at all in the original inception of the purpose jf makii-g the assault. Notwith- 
■tanding all that has been .said of his brutahty, he is one of 'he beM-tempered fdlowp I ever 
knew — impetuous, no doubt, and quick in resentment, but he did not intend what has been 
assigned to him. 

After all that hrs been said and done, on n post belhim extmination, what is it? A fight in 
the Senate chainber, resulting in two flpph wounds, which onght not to have detaiiicl him 
from the ber.-iie. Being rather a handsome man, ptrhaf s he would not like to expose himself 
by making his appearance for some time ; but if he. had teen in the army, there was no reason 
why he should not go to the field the next day ; and he w luld ("eserve to be cashiered if he did 
not go. What does his physician say .' He says that there were but two fl-sli wounds ; that 
hi- never had a fever while under his care and attendance, and ttat he was ready to come into 
the Senate the next day but for his advice ; and his advice was, that he should not come into 
the Senate, because it would a^grava'e the excitement alrcr'dy too high. He did not recom- 
mend him not t* go into the c 'mmittee-room to be examined on the ground tiiat his wounds 
had er.feebhd him, but for other considerations, becau.<:e it might agL^ravate the excitement 
already prevailing to an extent whiih might Uad to ml^-chiev()us consequences. 

Thi.s, then, i.s the mode of redress to which Mr. bKooKS resort' d. 1 do not say what I 
should have advisi d him to do, but perhaps it was forr.unate that I was aleent in oni; respect, 
fori certainly should not hjve su'imilted to that insult. Possibly it might not have In en 
offered if 1 were prcFcnt, though I do not know the fact, bec.ai^e I cannot say excily what 
would be the course of one of those persons who have a way c f fabricating spcechis Per- 
haps, be ng in his speech, he would have had to reed it ; but I think it possible thnt on the 
appeal which I would have made on my discretion, his friends rviight have inducid him to re- 
form it in some way so as to conform at lea-t to the requiremeii's of common decency in 
public opinion. It he had rot done so, I do not know what wou'd have been my course. 

For this transaction, as 1 havedctaded it, and without the intedigence which I hcive detailed 
being before them, the legiflature of Massachusetts have sent their resolutions here. Thesa 



resolutions are without a precedent in the history of this country. I hope other senators will 
speak to them, for they are not only an insult to South Carolina and her representatives in 
Congress, bull think they assail tlie constitution of the country. Before commenting on 
them, I may be permitted to allude to the first precedent of a congressional fight, which was 
between two members from New England. 

This affair is said to be an evidence of southern violence and southern ruflianism. Some 
papers speak of the bowie-knife and the revolver of southern blackguards. V/hy, sir, the 
first figiit whkh took place in Congresoi was between Matthew Lyon and Roger Griswoid, 
from Connecticut. Our ancestors in those days looked upon a fight with very little of the im- 
p.^rtance which is now attached to it. They said it was so unimportant that they were vexed 
that so much of the time of the Houpe was occupied in considering it. 

It seems that Matthew Lyon, originally an officer in the army, had been cashiered, and 
awarded a v/ooden sword. He then lived in Connecticut. At that time — and at this, too— 
in Cunneciicut, there was a pretty pressing opinion against a low man, and he could not stand 
it. He had to move over into Vermont, a new State, then the friintier of the country. He 
was elected a member of Congress from Vermont. He was one of the democi-ats. I suppose 
he was one of the red republicans of that day against John Adams's administration. Was 
be a democrat .' 

Mr, FOt")T. Yes, sir; he was a democrat. 

Mr. BUTLER. It was before the gentleraan from Vermoht taught school there, and Lyon 
assumed to be a kind of apostle of liberty and democracy. Not satisfied with instructiag the 
people of Vermont, he went to Mr. Gnswold, of Connecticut, stood behind his seat, and told 
him: "Sir, ynudo not represent Conncc'icut correctly; 1 know these people; they are mean 
people ; t:hey will take $1,0U0 as soon as $9,000 for a salary." Griswoid stood it for a great 
while. Finally, ^on gaid: " I will go over to Connecticut ; I v/ill talk to these people, and 
I will hive an infmence upon them ; I v/ill show whether you ought to occupy your seat or 
not." Griswoid sai I, " I ho|/e you will not go with your wooden sword " 

He repeated this twice ; and, after somebody suggested to Lyon that the third time was too 
muiih, he spit in Griswoltf's face. A great hubbub was raised, and Lyon was broui^ht up, I 
suppose, to hi--^ perfect delight, to be tried a-T to whether he should be expelled from the Hoiiae 
of Represent uives or not. On thi following day Griswoid involved himself in a difnculiy 
without any consideration. He took a good hickory stick and went to Lyon. He did not 
give him any notice at all. They fought with hickory slicks, and spit-boxes, and tongs, all 
over the House of Representatives, while the House was in srssion. 

Our hardy ancestors at that time did not think a fight of so much importance that they 
should take it into s^ rious consideration. They said, let tliem both go. They refused to expel 
either of them. When Mr. Randolph struck Mr. Aih-tine, the matter was brought before the 
Housp. But none of these things were consiiiered of a sufficient magnitude to invoke the high 
function of a Jcgisktiure sending its missive to Congress to tell them what to do. Massachu- 
setts is the first to set the example She has not only administered a reprimand to Mr. Brooks 
without any evideice; she has not only assumed to pronounce judgment before hearing the 
evidence, like a judge passing sentence on a criminal before hearing his defence ; but she hftS 
undertaken indiscrimina'ely to say that she demands of the Congr.-ss of the United States to 
carry out her behests in regard to what she considers to be an outrage upon the privileges of 
the Senate. 

Can anything be more insultinj to the Congress of the United States than the spectacle of a 
State sendmg down a message to its " faithful Comm'>ns " — a iricssage that they are to pro- 
nounce this or that judgment.' Are we to submit to this.' I did not wish to make the con- 
test ; but, in my opinion, these resolutions, in the terms they import, ought not to have been 
received by the Senate. 

Takin^j; all these things into consideration, indicted as Mr. Brooks has been by an ex 
prnte accu.sation, without evidence, without even the finding of a grand jury, what is his posi- 
tion? If his case could go before any impartial tribunal, and I could employ counsel such as I 
v/ould select, probably I would choose my friend from California, [Mr. Weller,] who lives 
in a free State, who is an impartial man, an advocate, a gentleman, a man of honor and 
courage. 

If a civil action were brought by Mr. Sumver against Mr Brooks for assault and battery, 
I pledge myself ihat, with ail the resources he could bring to his command, he would be able 
to reduce the verdict to a penny damag"s. What would be the .«tate of the pleadings.' Mr. 
Brooks struck Mr Sumner would be the allegation. It would be admitted that he struck him, 
and inflicted two flesh wnunds. Mr. Sumner would reply, "1 am a senator of the United 
States; and although the Senate was not in session, I was in that sicred temple, and my 
character is so sanred under the privileges of the Senate that I am not to be assailed." What ■ 
would Mr. Brooks's counsel rejoin.' The rejoinder would be, "Sir, you had profaned and 
disgraced the seat you occupied before you were struck.'' 

Then the question would be, what i,^ this privil'^ge so much spoken of — freed. m of debate? 
The court would examine the question whether wliat was said was privileged within the rules 
of the Senate, or whether it was a libel. If it should be pronounced to be a libel, and I were 
the juiige before whom an action were brought — if a man brought before me could show that 
another inmlted his mother, or his father, cr his sister, or himsdr, or his country, I would 



23 

say to tlie man who iiflictcJ the blow. " My duty is to fine you ; you are not justified by the 
liiw ; but ii is my [irivilr^c to tay that, w liildt I will enliTcc the luw und rriainluiii ila diijnity, 
1 siiull fine you as small a.'-uin os i | ossibly can wiihin my tli.S'.rc tion." 

iVow 1:1 nv: stale ihe tesiiino'iy in MUch an action. It would be tUut, in tho absence of tha 
soj.ator from Souili Carolina, Mr Sumner roeo in his f.e,\t, and pronouiiird what n'lrthcrn 
pi^icrs ilieniselves tay is an unparaHel' d insult, not only to the State of South Carolina, but 
to iier al)seiit acnator. Ii is one fir wir.cli 1 cannot iiccouiil. I ouijht to tlini.k one of ihe 
Bjsti n oilitors — I think the editor of tho Courift — for a beiuiiful, i erhapa on undentrvcd com- 
plmunt, which he has [)aid to my speech. 1 ought to thank hini here pub.icJy, hs one who 
lui.s iiide;ienden<e enous;ii to express his opinions in oppoHition to the tide prevailing in hts 
rart of ilie country. In my absi'ixc, laiiguii,'e was used of me, winch, I venture to .say, no 
one wlio knew me boiieved. I misht put ihat question to the senuor's colleague. I know 
noitiing against cither of the scnutiirs from Mass-ar.husetts personally or privately. 1 dare 
say, as neighbors and individuals, 1 should not have the leirit right to compi lin of ihcir ju'lg- 
ment out>ide of the influrnces which nj)?rate upon tkem publicly and politicully. Tli-iy have 
no right here to attack any man's private character. I never transgre^<sed the limits of pro- 
priety to reach over and look ut any man's private character. 1 do not know that I h ive 
enythirg sgainst Mr. Sumxeu's private character ; but that h'.s nothing to do with the matter. 
Here, in iiis p'ace, in colore officii, as a senator from Mass ictiUsettg, he uidertook to traduce 
and calumniate the revolutionary liistory of South Carolina, and to make remarks in regard 
to one of iier senators on this floor, a coequal with him, to which no one could have submitted. 
It iiappcns that tliat senator was the constituent of a member of the House of Rfpresenfatives, 
who was his friend. That frien I, finding that his own blood was insulteJ by an insult to his 
absent relative, was goaded on by the necessity of circumst mco to take some measure of 
revenge. As I said ye.<teiday, surely, un-Jcr such circumstances, much is to' be pardoned to 
the feelings of a mnn acting under such motives. 

Wiih tuese remarks I dismiss the resolutions of Massachusetts, hopirg that somebody cl9« 
besides a senator from Sjuth Carolina v/ill say something of iheoi, for I do tK>t wish to iden- 
tify myself too much with them as a per.-onal matter. 1 have attempted to keep aloof from 
that. 

The senator from Massachusetts, in his speech, made one or two allusions which I mustin- 
cadeiitally rotce to show ho»v erroneous he is whenever he touches any subject. He says I 
iniu'ged i i licehtioua abuse of the p* ople of Kansas. When he speaks of the people of Kan- 
sas, 1 suppose he mean.s tfiose who were sent there by the aid societies. I presume he con- 
siders nobo-y as the people of Kansas excep'. those who have the impression upon them of 
the people wnom he designates to choose anu comprehend within the term, " people of Kan- 
sas.'' He hjs no rcgarU for the people of Kentucky, of Missouri, of lo^va, of Virginia, of 
South Carolina, who may have gone into that Ferrito.y, but he tays I have aljused its people. 
I never dui abuse them. I did say that the man who came h' re with the so-called [letition of 
Kaflsus in his hinds without signatures, was atteuipting lo come into the fold of this federal 
governinent by a fiaud. I did not use as btr.mg an i xpres.ion as my friend from Louisiana, 
[Mr. Gen'jxmi.s',] my friend from Virginia, [Mr. Maso.s,] and otheis. I did not say that the 
petition was a f rgery. I denounced it as a violation (.f the rules of the Senate to print a pa- 
per of ;hat kind, or to give it the dignity of a paper coming from a Stire. I'his is all that I 
said. 1 did not aouse the people. Bat what does Mr. Su.mver say of the portion, my por- 
tioii, if h • choKS s to Cail them sa, though I Oo not wish so to characterize thci, of the people 
of KauS-is? He speaks of them as " hireiing.s, picked fro.n the drunken spew and vomit of 
an uneasy civilization — \n the form of men — 

" ' Ay, in the catalogue ye go for men; 

As hounds and greyhounds, mongrels, spaniels, curs, 
S.'ioughs, water-rugs, and demi-wulves, are called 
Ah by the name of dogs.' " 

Sir, he could not have provoked me in the spirit of controvensy to say that. I have no donbt 
many worthy individuals have gone there under the influence of aid societies; I have r.ot com- 
pared them, as the senator hes those who h^ivegone t < re fion Arkansas, Alissouri, and Vir- 
ginia, to ih^ genus of wolves, dogs, and hirelings from the spew of an uneasy civilization. 
All are dogs, in his estimation, that do not come under the imriression of liis endorsement. 
This is language which I could not use of any set of men with whom I was not acquainted. 
If I were to settle in Kansas to-mnriow among those very people, I think it probable that I 
shoultl be on ^ood terms with thtni;for 1 have never had a dispute with a neighbor. I do ncDt 
think the^e p ople would disturb me. B'lt what think you of this denunciation — thi^ rhetori- 
cal boiiiuardment from the Senate of the United States of a class of individuals as honorable 
and brave a set of men, I doulit not, as .vny other, though, perhaps, reckless to Fome extent.' 
I regret the issue pending in Kansas. I s.nd before, and now repeat, that the very last fate to 
which this country tihould be reduced, would be to coir:mit the arbitrament of great questions 
to the iss .e of the ^word in the hands of y^uth willing to contend and pleased wiih the pride 
of ergiging in arms, and hiving bestowed on them all the fascination which can be imparted 
by danger a'»d trial. 



24 

There is anoiher part of his speech to which I must allude, v/hich evinces — T do not like to 
use the word, but 1 cannot ht-lp it — ihe charlatan more than any prodm tion of his that I have 
ever seen I was surfirised when [ saw it, and I venture to say there is not a person who hears 
me real it but will .-hare my surprise. On a former occasion, 1 spoke of serving the common- 
law process upon Sharpf's rifli s. The senator from Massachusetts undertook to say that 1 
maintained the opinion that it was the duty of the government to take ttie rifles out of the 
hands of those who had them. Who evtr under^tood anything of that kind from my re- 
marks ? I used " Sharpe's rifles" as I would u^e the name of a corporation to serve procesa 
upon, but I had no idea of going and taking (he rifles out of the hands of individuals. Let me 
read that part of h s speech in which he treats of it : 

" Next comes the Remedy of Folly, which, indeed, is also a Remedy of Tyranny ; but its 
Folly is so surpassing as to eciipfe even its Tyranny. It dots not proceeij from the President. 
With this preposition he is not in any way ch ngeaole. It comes from the senator from South 
Carolina, who, at the closeof a long speech, offered it as his sinijle contribution to the adjust- 
ment of this question, and who thus far stands alone in its support. It might, therefore, fitly 
bear his name ; but that which I now give to it is a rDore suggestive synonym. 

"This proposition, nakedly expressed, is that the people of Kansas should be deprived of 
their arms. That I may not do the least injustice to the senator, 1 quote his precise words : 

" ' The Presid' nt of the United States is under the highest and most solemn obligation to 
interpose; and if I were to indicate the manner in which he should interpose in Kansas, I 
would poinfout the old common-'aw process. 1 would serve a warrant on Sharpe's rifles, 
and if Sharpe's nfl^.s did not answer the summons, and come into court on a day certain, or, 
if they resiisted the sheriff', [ would suoimon the posse comitatus, and would have Colonel 
Sumner's regiment to be a part of that^o.sse comitatus.^ 

" Really, .-ir, has it come to this? The r fl^ has ever been the companion of the pioneer, 
and, under God, his tutelary protector against the red man and the beast of the forest. Never 
was this efficient weapon more needed in just selfdefdnce than now in Kansas, and at least 
one article in our national cons'itution mu-t be blotted out before the complete right to it can 
in any way be impeaclied. And yet, buch is the madness of the hour, that, in dttiance o! the 
solemn guarantee, embodied in the amendments to the constitution, that 'the right of the 
people to Keep and bear arms shall not be infringed,' the people of Kansas have been arraigned 
for kteping and bearing them, and the senator from S )Uth Carolina has had the face to say 
openly, on this floor, that they should be disarmed — of course, tliat the fanatics of slavery, 
his allies and cons iiuents, may meet no iiiipediment. Sir, the senator is venerable with years ; 
he is reputed also to have worn at home, in the State which he lepresents, j idicial honors; 
and he is placed here at the head of an important committee occupied particuliirly with 
questions of law ; but neither his years nor hts position, past or prt sent, can give respect- 
ability to the demand he has ttiade, or save him Irom indignant contiemnation, when, to com- 
pass the wretched purposes of a wretched cause, he thus proposes to trample on one of the 
plainest provisions of constitutional liberty." 

His conclusion is that I intended to send a posse there to take away the rifles from those 
who owned them. 1 simply said that iliere was an organized body whose pronomen was 
Sharpe's nfl s, and that 1 would serve sui h process as to bring them betbre the court. This 
was the plain meaning of my larguage. I wnuld not take them unless ihey resisted. If they 
were ois[osed to answer in court, I v/ould let them answer ; I *ould indict iheni for resistance 
to the law, and have a fair and open Iri .1 before a jury. This was my meaning. He has 
gone off uith a beautiful conception '» hich may suit ttie meridian — no, sir, I will not say it, 
for I I'elieve it suits no meridian where intelligence, and good sense, and honor, and justice 
prevail. 

There is one point upon which I have ne doubt the senator will be more sore under my 
criticism than in regard to almost anything else, though it does not afl^'ect his honor, nor do I 
know that it off cts his pO(i„l:ir reputation. He ha.s chosen to go out of his way to make a 
fling at me, by saying that I never can be right in my statements of law or constitution, or 
even in the diversions of scholarship. Now, what did I see the other day? 1 do not believe 
that the senator is guilty of meanness, but his papers are full of the idea — and they have almost 
made a caricature nf i' — that when I wanted a Laiin quotation I had to hand it over to him, 
and then brin? it back and put it befoie the pu'dic. When Mr. Sumner and myself .sat near 
each other, I did not hesitate to trdk to him aonut Latin. I believe the only time I ever asked 
htm for a qiiotaion was for one which I intended to insert in my obituary notice of Mr. 
Webster ; and I rec'dlect that on one occasion I m-de a quotation from Juvenal, and he gave 
me the Latin, ti r which I was very mu^ h obliged to h m. 1 do net pretend to compete with 
Mr Sumner in ihe attainments of scholarsliip"; but I must ."^ay of him, whatever may be his 
attainments as a scholar, I very mucl fenr he is like one of those who has a full supply of 
water in n IS mill-pond, but does not know how to turn it on a whel so as to move tiie ma- 
chinery ; or, rather, it is such an even current that it runs upon a g"ntle deehvity, and has no 
fall to lu n any wheel at all. He has enough of it, and ti '\' ahvays running, but what good it 
has done I do not know. I said on one occasion that he had not made it eubaervient to the 






M 

judgment of a statesman ; nor do I believe he has used it as an orator would do on a hifh 
theme. 

The best part of his late speech is a periphrasis of Demosthenes — nimost a servile imitation 
of the apostrophe of Ornio'^ihenpa. I never saw surh a reniarkab'e resenib'ance. When I 
Bald yesterday thut this speech h id an uidentity wiili liis f )rmer ones, I should hove exrrptod 
this pas.oase, which alnpttd the Inn^uasjo and the sptiiimenis of Demosihr^nes. I do not sav 
it is a piasinrism ; bur ii is a remarkable imitation, ns fur as one man incapnii|<; ofcomprehend- 
ing the true si'irit of Demosthenes could imitate him. Let me give you the two passagea. 
Here ia Dem( stheno.s ujion the crown sj)paking to the Aihenians upon the responsibility of a 
man who was conlendinv for his reputdtion and his administration : 

"It cannot be that yon have acted wrong in encountering danger fir the liberty and safety 
of all Greece. No! By the genrrou.^ soul.s who were exposed at Marathon ! lly those who 
Btood arrayed at Platxa ! By those who encountered the Per.sian fleet at Sal imis — who fought 
at Artemisium! Bv all those illustrious sons of Athena whose remains lie deposited in ih« 
public monument'' ! " •«•»««» 

" What belongs to gallant men they all performed ; their success was such as Providence 
dispensed to each." 

Here is Mr. Sdmner, speaking of Massachusetts : 

" But it cannot be that she acts wrong for herself and children when in this cause she thua 
encounters reproach. No! By the generous souls who were exposed at Lexingion — by 
those who stood arrayed at Bunker Flill — by the many from her bosom who, on ail the fields 
of the first grea' struggle, lent their vigorous arms to the great cau.se of all — by ihe children 
she h.is borne, whose names alone are national trophies — is Massachusetts now vowed irrevo- 
cably to this work. What belongs to the faithful servant she will do in all things, and Provi- 
dence shall determine the result." 

Here you have Lexington substituted for Marathon, and Bunker Hill for Plata;a; and he 
has nameu Lexington and Bunker Hill, for they, 1 believe, are the only battles of the Revolu- 
tion fought in Massachusetts, and they are glorious fields. This, as 1 have said, is a remark- 
able imitation. It is the best pirt of the speech. It is the only thing, exceftt those polluting 
personalities to which I have allndfd — but 1 will not use that term, because they hurt nobody — 
which dis^iiiguisiies it fixjm his former efforts. 

Mr Presidtni, I have convicted the senator of making a speech which was not in respon.se 
to anything I said. 1 have convicted him of such histoiical errors as no man can mistake. 
I ♦'ave convicted him of ma*<ing allegations against me of being ignorant of \>\v and of consti- 
tutions, and yet when he undertook to quote and expound the constitution of South Carolina, 
1 have shown that he either never read that constitution, or he could not und<.rstjnd it, or, if 
be did understiind it, he wilfully misrepresented it. He has been guilty of the suppressio veri 
and the suggestio falsi. He cannot escape from these propositions. 

I have a copy of the ser-.ator's speech before me, and now I am going to turn his gun upon 
him. I a.sk the Senate to see if I do not turn it upon him to such an extent as to allow me t* 
apply the apposite quotation of which I have <.fcen made use : 

"Fabu'a narratur, 
< Mutato nominee, de te." 

Here ia what he says of me : 

"With regret I come again upoD the senator from South Carolina, [Mr. Butler,] who, 
omnipresent in this debate'' — 

Why, sir, I have counted the Congressional Globe, and my remarks make but twelve 
pages, while his are tliirty-two. I have not gone into the subject at as great length as my 
friends from Alabama, [Mr. Clay,] Georgia, [VIr. Toombs,] and others. My Sfieeches all 
put together on this subject are but twelve pages, and hiy ar* thirty-two ; while those of hia 
coadjutors^ amount, I suppose, to a hundred more. Yet he said I was omnipresent in thia 
debate ! 1 vkjil not say that he in omnipresent in this debate, but he is omnipresent everywhera 
out of the debate. He says that I " overflowed with r.igc at the simple suggestiin that 
Kansas had applied for admission as a State, and, with incoherent ])'ra-es, discharged tha 
loose cxpictoraiion of his speech, now upon her repre-^cntatives, and then upon her people." 
I said it was a fraud, and the >enaie said so. Why did he tingle me out.' Aaain, alluding to 
me, he said : 

"There was no extravagance of the ancient f'arliamentary debate which he did not repeat ; 
nor was t'ere any ( ossible deviation fi(>m truth which he did not make, with so much of 
passion, I am glaM to add, as to save him fom the Buspicion of intentional aberration." 

Ido not know ih It F have ever been an imitator in my life. Those who know me best aay 
tliatlam ia.\\ev stii generis. I never borrow from Demo.-thenes, and palm it ( ff as my own. 
As for my deviation from the truth, let me a.«k, did he tell the truth when he quoted ihe con- 
stitution of South Carolina, and there was no such clause in it as he stated' Did he tell the 



26 

truth when he undertook to say that her imbecility was shr.mcful during the Revolution? 1 
have shown that she absolutely sent bread to Massachusetts. Did he tell the truth when he 
meant to impute to me what he has charged here? 1 retort up'jn him everythinu; that fol- 
lows. 

I retort on him the very language which he applies to me. He accused me of such a pro- 
clivity to error thatl could not conform to the linn of truth, or wa« continually deviatiig from 
it. 1 have convicted him before the Srnaie, by the evidence which I have adduced, of calum- 
niating thf history and character of South Carolina, and of misrepresenting her constuution. 
He has done this, not in response to anything I had said, or anyihinij; which was legitimately 
connected with the debate. He has undertaken to charge me with ignorance of the law and 
the constitution, which is perfectly independent of his arbitrary dictum — the dictum, allow me 
to say, of a man who has never conducted a great law case in this country. 1 believe no one 
would buy an estate worth .$10,000 upon his opinion of the title. I would not engage him to 
conduct a cause ; not that he is not a clear man, hut I would not trust him as a lawyer. And 
yet he undertakts to be my judge. What right has he to pronounce judgment on me as a law- 
yer.' I am reduced to a pretty predicament at this time of life, if lam to be subjected to such 
a judgment ! It is a judgment about which I care little ; aisd I do not suppose any man would 
give fifty dollars for it even in Massachusetts. 

*' He cannot ope his mouth but out there flies a blunder." 

I sificerely hope that what he has said is a blunder. I do not know but that he may have 
thought he would escape scrutiny and exposure I hope that when he opened his mouth and 
said what he did in reference to these matters it was a blunder. He said of me, " the senator 
touches nothing which he does not disfigure." I can say of him he has touched nothing 
which he has not misrepresented, except it be in his general declamation, and there is no de- 
tecting a man in that ; it is a matter of taste. I appreciate highly the compliment I received 
this morning in the Boston Couiier as to the merit of my speech. The senator says of me, 
that " the senator touches nothing which he does not disfigure — with error, sometimes of prin- 
ciple, sometimes of fact." I apply this to him wiih this exception: I say error nearly always 
Of principle, sometimes of fact. 1 leave the Senate to decide between us in that respect. Again 
he said of me: 

" He shows nn incapacity of accuracy, whether in stating the constitution or in stating the 
law — whether in the details of statistics, or the diversions of scholarship." 

I shall not compete with him in scholarship, for I should be vulnerable there ; but men wha 
live in glass houses should never throv/ stones. Of all the things which that senator ventured 
to do, 1 think he exposed his house most when he made that assertion, with the detection which 
I have fixed upon him of error, injustice, and malignity. It is nailed upon him, and he cannot 
get rid of it I care not how far fanaticism may undertake to influence the judgment of public 
opinion ; it cannot alter the truth. Truth is sometimes slow in making its impression on the 
public ir.ind, but, when made, it is evidence which produces a belief that cannot be reeisted. 
That belief will grow out of my statements, my remarks, and my refeiences, and is just as 
certain as the truth of the evidence, and he cannot escape from it. 

Mr. President, I have detained the Senate much longer than I wished. When I gave notice 
that I should speak to the resolutions of Massachusetts, it was with perfect confidence that the 
senator would be in his seat. Finding that these resolutions were not here, on Monday last I 
gave notice that I should speak on Thursday, still confident that he would be hH-c. Yesterday, 
having heard that perhaps he would not be present, I inquired, in as delicate a manner as I 
could, when he would be here Although our relations are not friendly, I did not wUh to as- 
sume a position which would be even apparently inconsistent with fair chivalry and licaring. 
1 inquired whether he would be in the Senate within a fortnight, and, if so, I .«a:d I would 
postpone my remarks. Finding that it was his purpose to go in a few days to Massachusetts, 
and that he would not be likely to return for three or four weeks, I could not allow the oppor- 
tunity to pass. I have stated the.^e facts to show that I do not stand here taking advantage of 
his absence. I was willing to wait any reasonable time, but I ci^uld not allow error to prevail 
longer in relation to my State, my friend, or myself This is my position. 

Sir, if there is any one individual who more than another regrets the occasion on which I 
have spoken, it is myself. I have no temper for strife I am passing through the last chapter 
of my public life, and I have no wish to identify my name with anything like a personal con- 
troversy. I have never sought it. When the question comes to be examined and solved, 
Who was the aggressor.' it will be found that it wag not I on any occasion. I admit that I 
have three peculiarities of manner: impatience, excitability, and, perhaps, absent-mindedness. 
They are peculiarities which have followed me from the cradle. But, sir, I hope I have never 
known the time when reason and repentance would not suppress even a temporary injustice. 
If injustice isd iueto me, or a wrong or insult oflered, I never stop to parley in words. I ask 
justice, and if it is not given, 1 never would be in the wrong if I could help my-elf ; but when I 
am in the right I do not think any man can blame me for v ndicating my principles. 

Now, sir, I appeal to the good sense of this country. I appeal to the lessons which its grave 
history inculcates. I appeal to the position which it occupies in relation to the history 
of the world, and to the high responsibilities which now rest on this confederacy, noj 



2T 

to allow It to be diBsoIvcd in olood. If we are to separate, let us have common scnFc enough 
to do It in a way becoming intelligent men who have learned their lessons fn.m the hi.'hest 
Bources of intelligence and wisdom. If we tire to live together, Iti it not be upon the iorma 
preecnhed or intimated l.y the tone and temper of the lirenii.,uH and a-rgreHBivc luneuagc of the 
apcech delivered by the senator from Massachnsctts. It is impoBsible for seJf-reBpect to allow 
me to sit here and listen quietly to surh a speech. If there were m pnruto confederacies to-mor- 
row, he dare not utter it without subjecting himself to a peril which he will not encounter 
now. He wculd then put his fection in a position to molte war, and he would l>e reaponsi- 
b)e to a higher trilninal than that of those who have erected themselves into it under an 
influence which I think must peribh ; and 1 hope the day is fast coming when the fires of 
that limited Ecctionalism will burn out, or will be reduced to the tishea of disappointment and 
disgrace, ' ' 



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